Goddess of War
by Trojan Seeress
Summary: A young woman from our world wakes up with the brain power of an A.I. in the tender care of Cerberus. Four years before Eden prime and unsure if she will make it that long, She sets out to prove her worth. Will she rise to glory like the phoenix or fall to rampancy like her forebears. Can a human A.I. truly survive or will her mind shatter from the strain of her intellect?
1. escape!

**Goddess Of War**

A/n- Hello everyone, this is an idea that has been swimming in and out of my mind for a while. Worry not, Son of the Dragon will still be updated, but I felt like this might get me out of the rut I've been in. Please read and review to tell me what you think and if I should write more of this. At the moment it is merely a crazy idea that came after three all nighters preparing for exams. If I receive enough encouragement I will write more.

Thank you to all for your support and your reviews. Also I am looking for a beta, Pm me if you are interested

Safe travels, Trojan Seeress.

Disclaimer: I own nothing save for Athena. Bioware has that honour

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 **1- Escape!**

"Download complete" the faint electronic voice whispered. If she had been able to move she would have blinked, it felt like she was waking up, yet her body was unresponsive, bands of ice encircled her wrists and ankles, holding her down to a frigid surface. "Neural output at 2%, small spike due to recent information dump. Proceeding with external stimulus" the voice continued.

She felt confusion, where was she? What had happened? The last thing she could remember was walking home from university, then nothing. Before she could wonder much further, a searing pain exploded along her nerves. Her body writhed and twisted in an automatic response to escape the pain that burned through every vein and limb, her back arched and her head thrashed weakly but there was no escape.

She felt like her skin was being peeled off while battery acid was being dripped on the exposed muscle beneath. Then, like the flipping of a switch, it vanished. Her body sank back onto the surface and returned to its previous inert state. "Basic physiological response, increasing magnitude and re-initializing" the voice reported.

Before she could even think, the pain returned, worse than before, she felt her body's mouth open and keen in pain, automatic whimpers in a primitive response to lessen the pain. This cycle of torture continued, and her mind retreated behind walls as it attempted to shield itself from what was being done to her body.

She felt scalpels slice through skin, needles jab into veins, eyes, unseeing and unmoving were operated on and foreign chemicals poured through her system. All she could do was sit and watch as her body was violated down to it's very DNA. The "External Stimulus" sessions continued, as her captors attempted to elicit a sentient reaction from her shell, but she pulled away even more. Living through her old memories of her life before the pain and dark and hiding among the terabytes of data they had crammed into her head.

Calculations she had never learned but some how intrinsically understood floated past and she played with their variables, twisting them in strange and fantastic ways as she tried to distract her mind from her body.

"Still no response?" a female voice asked from outside and she turned her attention to listen, sometimes she could glean information about her captors when they mused over her shell.

"No, still unresponsive, though there has been a steady increase in neural activity, it is not affected by what's happening though, so I doubt that it has anything to do with her waking up" a Male voice answered.

"It. Kowalski. Its not a she, and its not a human, remember that. It's a collection of cells we grew in a vat and stuffed its head with information. The fact that it looks like a human female was an aesthetic choice by the Illusive man so it could match its project name" the female voice commanded sharply and she felt a flash of recognition.

The Illusive man. She knew that name, but that was fiction. Skeins of information rose from the sea: Illusive man, Cerberus, The Citadel, System's Alliance. Her mind dug through it in the nanoseconds that it took for the people out side to pause in their conversation.

"Then why give her.. it a female name?" the male demanded.

"Subject Metis is designed to be a mobile combat and intelligence unit, able to pass through security and acquire data undetected." The woman informed him tersely, "the illusive man likes his mythology, and subject Metis has had, what equates to an A.I. loaded into its head. By tomorrow the neural control chip will be placed and the unit will be ready to being infiltration" the sound of footsteps walked away from her and she felt her entire mind narrow it's focus to a single pin prick.

Neural control chip? A.I. in my brain? Cerberus is real? Oh hell no! with an effort that no human mind could understand she focused her entire augmented mind into action, determined to take control of the shell that housed her and remove herself from this prison. She had played the games, she knew how this went: Modern Gamer gets put into video game, uses knowledge to kick ass and hopefully take names, knock the council's heads out of their ass. Take over as the shadow broker and beat the reapers back into whatever hell they had crawled out of. Win the day and get the love interest, maybe with Shepard. She had to escape first though.

She marshalled the immense mental power that fluttered through dozens of thought processes simultaneously into a single cohesive unit and pushed. It was agony, but a lesser one compared to what she experienced in the "Stimulation" sessions. With the speed of a supercomputer at her back she attached her mind to her body.

She gained a new appreciations for the complexity of the human nervous system as she went, but within an hour, an interminable amount of time to her hyper active mind, She was finished. She held her body as it had been before she had linked into it and extended her mind in a careful, and almost instinctual action. She could feel the systems that held her in place. Count the people and droids that walked the halls. She was the station and the station was her.

The feeling of duality in having two bodies, was almost a relief from having her entire mind focused on one thing. A handful of firewalls tried to hold her back, but instinctively she slid through them like a ghost. Oh the fools, this was a space station. She mused before she sealed the lab that held her and diverted all life support to her location. Then in an act of revenge for pain and violation, she opened every airlock and blast door, save for the room that held her.

She watched from the cameras as her torturers and creators were sucked out into space, watched them freeze and die as they asphyxiated. Once the sensors confirmed that there was not a single living soul aboard the station, she shut the doors and re-initiated life support. A flash of thought unlocked her restraints and she opened her eyes for the first time in this new world. The room was white, clinical and cold. Various machines hung over her like the limbs of a spider about to wrap her in it's web.

She rolled her head to the side and saw a collection of tubes emerging from ports in her veins. Her mind swiftly isolated the liquids in her veins from those ports and identified them as nutrients and an unknown chemical compound that seemed to numb the cells and nerves it came into contact with, the chemical was new, indicating that they were prepping her for something.

A swift hack into the logs showed the compound to be a sedative to keep her from moving during the chip implantation process that would have happened tomorrow. With heavy limbs, she reached out and yanked the tubes from her arm, throwing them away from herself and struggling to shunt the chemicals from her system.

Her amplified mind had complete and utter control over every function, if she wanted she could stop her own heart, but she swiftly dedicated thought skeins to ensure her body continued to function now that she was in control. Using this control she upper her body's metabolism, desiring to flush the chemicals from her system. With that being taken care of she sat up and began taking stock of her body. Two arms, two legs. Fiver fingers on each hand and five toes per foot.

A quick glance down showed she was naked and female, several healing scars on the thighs that were nearly indistinguishable from the rest. Pale skin that had clearly never seen the light of the sun, blemish free, covered well formed limbs that from what she could remember, were aesthetically pleasing. Obviously whatever template they had used to make this body had been a good one.

She gingerly swung her legs over the side of her table and slid down till they touched the floor. Her muscles were wobbly and unsteady, and she gripped the table to keep from falling. She trembled from cold as she pushed away from the table and tottered unsteadily towards the door. It opened at her instinctive command and she followed her mental map through the halls, growing more confident with each step.

She was walking easily by the time she reached the living quarters and began to rummage through the uniforms that hung in lockers. Eventually she found one that fit her tall but slender frame and slid it on. Her fingers fumbled with the fasteners while her mind trawled through unnumbered amounts of data looking for how they worked. Eventually she succeeded and the ill fitting jumpsuit was secured. Clothed now she sat on the edge of the cabin's bed and she put her head in her hands.

Ok, first thing she knew was that she had been walking home from university and something had happened.

Second: she was apparently in the mass effect universe.

three: she was a recently freed test subject that had been in the loving care of Cerberus, until in true Cerberus test subject fashion, she had gone rogue and killed the team working on her.

Four: she had the mental capacity and capability of an extremely advanced A.I. in her head and a repository of knowledge for the current known Galaxy.

Five: she couldn't remember her own name, and apparently had been tortured for a recorded two years as she was experimented on and augmented.

Six: she was loaded up with enough hidden augmentations and downloaded training to make her one of, if not the deadliest human combatants known to the galaxy.

And seven: She had just murdered thirty-seven people aboard this station.

She took a deep shuddering breath as she tried to come to grips with what she had done. Even now, her mind began to throw up details, such as a slow replay of watching those people die in vacuum, while another part analyzed and highlighted exactly what was happening. Other streams of thought critiqued her speed in her take over of the station while a final thread analyzed how her actions would be viewed by others and the ethical ramifications of her actions.

Amid the mental torrent, she clung to the only thing she could. A fundamental question. "Who am I?" she mumbled to herself, surprised to find her face wet with tears as sobs began to grip her frame.

"WHO AM I!?" she screamed as she threw her head back. A primal scream tore itself from her throat as she clawed at her head, trying to silence her brain. "SHUT UP! SHUT UP SHUT UP!" she cried as her finger nails drew bloody gouges along her bald head. Hot blood poured from the scrapes and tricked down her neck and face.

It was warm, and she drew her hands away to stare at the blood that now stained them. Her tears continued to rain down as she stared, mixing with the warm blood that continued to flow.

"Why am I here?" she whispered. All the processes in her head ground to a halt, trying to process this question. But failing. She reveled in the moment of blessed silence and took a deep breath. She had been sucked into something she read from fanfiction, and now she was in possession of an intellect to rival Cortana from Halo, as far as she knew, she could have just as limited a shelf life.

She had the fore knowledge to help, and the technological know how to kick Cerberus up the ass before they became a problem. She closed her eyes and returned her bleeding head to her hands. If she was going to do this then she needed to decide how she was going to do this. If she knew anything about Cerberus, and she did.

Then they would not let a resource such as herself loose. Idly she checked at the cost it had taken to create her and gasped. Nine trillion credits had been poured into project Metis. She was subject thirteen, luck thirteen.

Apparently, her predecessors had been terminated due to insanity. But then, they had been allowed to be conscious and form personalities before the implantation process. She had the information implanted early on, while she was still in the test tube. How her modern personality and memories had joined in was a mystery, but she would take the luck she had.

Something told her that this was a second lease on life, something had happened to her on that walk home that had ended her chances of living there. She opened her eyes and stood, making her way over to the tiny bathroom that sat in the corner of the cabin. She approached the sink and after a moment's hesitation, looked into the mirror. Her face was aristocratic and beautiful despite the lack of hair. It was clear from the stubble that they shaved it regularly and if she let it grow that it would be dark.

She had high cheek bones and a narrow delicate nose that sat beneath high arching brows and above lips most women would kill for. A pointed chin and a heart shaped face gave her a regal appearance but it was the eyes that stopped the show. She had read of silver eyes but always pictured them as merely a light grey.

But her eyes were a true metallic silver edged with a slightly darker ring that differentiated between iris and sclera. They were almost luminous and looking into them she could see that that they had an unfathomable depth to them. She quickly turned her eyes away from her reflection and began to clean the scratches she had inflicted on herself.

She sent out a stream of thought to find out when she was in the timeline and blinked at the answer. 2179, four years before the Mass effect began. She closed her eyes and rested her forehead against the mirror. She had work to do, not the least of which was to get herself into a position to keep Cerberus from finding her and getting enough power to be of use to Shepard when the time came. Curious she tried to connect to the outside world but was blocked by several servers.

If she wanted to get out then she had to go through the Cerberus main system, and put her mind at risk of being caught. Option B was to use the shuttles and get the hell out of dodge after blowing the station to hell and back. With this in mind she purloined a spare omni tool and sacked the information banks of the Station, copying the information into her own mind, the safest place she could think of and hopped into the shuttle.

As she left the station behind she activated the self destruct protocols. A wave of satisfaction swept over her as she watched the station reduce itself to dust before her eyes in a flash of burning atmosphere and flying shrapnel. Sure now that no one could find the hell that had birthed her, she closed her eyes and leaned back in the pilot's chair and began to construct an Identity for herself.

"Subject Metis" she scoffed, a project named after the Titaness of wisdom and thought who was swallowed by Zeus. "Metis is dead, I am her daughter" she declared and began to fill out the forms with her new name. She carefully researched through the data bases and smiled when none of her favorites came up, the name she wanted would not raise any red flags.

If she was going to take this world by storm then it helped to have a name that evoked the strength of the bad ass bitches who had worn them before. "Confirm" she muttered as she looked at her new name with pride.

Athena Cortana Kerrigan. Named after the goddess of war and wisdom, an A.I. who had helped hold back the covenant and the Flood, and a woman who would save a universe from a fallen god. Also the last name sounded normal enough to pass as having eclectic parents with a love for unusual names. After all if Mass effect existed as a real place, why not others.

The shuttle sped into the relay system and she busied herself with the task of prepping her small shuttle for jump. As the blue lightning seized her craft and launched it towards omega she smirked, lets see how the galaxy would react to a powered up gamer.


	2. Hide!

**2- Hide!**

Her shuttle was now drifting near Omega and Athena was calculating. She knew her shuttle and the uniform she was wearing were plastered with Cerberus symbols, it was like they weren't even trying to be subtle and the last thing she needed was to broadcast her position or even remote affiliation with the terrorist organization. Her chances of getting off this shuttle normally without being spotted were slim to nothing. Well to tell the truth, they were at 2.340090807653524184% but she wasn't counting. The various plans she had come up with so far ranged from prohibitively stupid to just crazy enough to work, and that was if she was being generous.

With a huff, she settled on her most likely to succeed plan and set the shuttle on crash course with a carefully selected point on Omega, near one of the many disused docking bays. Then she set one of her thought threads to monitor it and walked to the locker in the back. Each shuttle was equipped with a hard suit capable of protecting its wearer from the cold of space, as well as carrying enough air to last twenty minutes of hard physical activity. One thought thread helpfully provided her with the data while another gave her a by blow account of exactly how this could go wrong. She winced as the visual image of a suit breach was played in her minds eye.

She shook her head and set the other threads to triple and quadruple check her calculations as she pulled on the one size fits all suit and prepped for what would either ensure she had breathing room to escape Cerberus, or make it so she didn't have to worry about anything ever again. Several thought threads tried to understand her cavalier acceptance of possible death but she shunted them back to the calculations.

The thread she had dedicated to watching her trajectory warned her that her window was rapidly approaching. She made some minor course corrections and sealed her suit, preparing for vacuum. With the final coordinates locked and the computer wiped and fried to prevent anything in the way of records from surviving, she opened the rear hatch. The decompression was quick and would have taken her with it if she hadn't been holding onto a rail designed for such an occurrence. A thread began a countdown from ten and she eased to the edge of the shuttle. Her fingers gripped the lip of the door as she lowed her body out of the craft.

The stone wall of omega rose above her, details rapidly becoming apparent. She adjusted her grip. Her plan was simple, but suicidal if a person couldn't run through over a thousand calculations in under a Nano-second and has the reflexes to pull it off. The timer flicked to zero and she swung her self off the shuttle and towards the wall of omega. She flew at an angle towards a defunct bay. With desperate speed, she set her threads to hacking into the ancient systems.

"Come on, come on, come on" she chanted under her breath as she worked. If she didn't get that doors open now, then she would splatter against them like a bug on a windshield. The doors shuddered and began to move, their guide rails rusted and damaged. They opened halfway, then shuddered to a stop. Five seconds till impact, a thread informed her whilst three more began calculating exactly how much this was going to hurt and what would happen if she failed.

Success rate sitting at 3.224% another thread informed her almost jovially. "Shit" she muttered and twisted her body to the side, thinning her profile and releasing a little of the oxygen in her suit to tilt her to the correct angle. The doors were open barely five feet, and she was approaching at a speed of at least thirty Km/h, it was going to be like threading a needle, and threading one at high speed. She grit her teeth and held her breath as she rocketed past the doors, the left most one scraping her back.

She grunted in pain before she hit the gravity of the station. In the fraction of a second before she hit, she let her body go limp. All air was driven from her lungs as her body hit unrelenting metal. Thank god that the suit had a hard shell designed to protect the wearer from space debris. She hit at an angle with her left side facing down and skidded across the metal floors. Sparks sprayed away from her and her left side exploded in pain.

Turns out her threads were correct as well. It hurt like a bitch! Available threads were sent to close the doors and wipe the records of them opening from the severs. Three threads were dedicated to expunging every piece of evidence from the stations sensors that her ship had even existed. All the while she lay on the ground in pain, wheezing like a landed trout as she attempted to get her body moving again. Still gasping and feeling like her ribs were on fire, she scraped her body off the ground and staggered to the inner air lock door, her right arm wrapping around her midsection, trying to hold her ribs together.

An internal monitor informed her that the third rib down on the left side had a hairline fracture and the others were already developing deep bone bruises. She could feel blood rushing to the skin on the left side, creating some marvelous bruises no doubt.

She cracked the door open and dragged herself through before she slumped against the wall, panting and gagging at the stench that was coming in through her nostrils as she activated the external filters on her helmet. It stank like burning garbage, asphalt, and burning motor oil. A thread was analyzing the smell and told her that apparently, she was smelling burnt Vorcha. She winced at the hypothesis as to why a Vorcha nearby was on fire.

She shook her head, intentionally bashing the helmet against the wall, trying to rattle the threads into some semblance of order. When they refused to cooperate, she growled and set three threads to monitoring her movement using the station security and any nearby electronics, purposefully instructing them to erase her form the minute it was recorded. That kept them busy as they began scanning. A handful of other threads were set to monitoring the comms around her, checking for key words such as Cerberus, target, Metis, experiment, subject, A.I., Athena Illusive man and Operative or any combination of those words.

She couldn't take any chances that she might be cornered. The rest she set to form bank accounts under several false names and to begin skimming credits from cash transactions that were happening all around her. No big amounts, just a single credit off of a transaction here, three from an arms deal there. Barely specks of dust from the millions that swam past her. It was like catching minnows with her bare hands, tedious and slow, even for her.

She decided to let those credits sit as an emergency fund for if she needed to get out in a hurry. The credits funnelled themselves through the extranet as those threads worked hard to hide where the money was coming and going, some writing programs to continue this with instinctive ease.

She took a moment to frown at how instinctive and easy it was for her to act on the digital level but shook her head. She couldn't look a gift horse in the in her old life she had been as technologically incompetent as it was possible to be and still work and android, but now she had only one thing going for her, and that was her hacking ability.

Lastly she dedicated four threads to hunting down transactions by the Shadow broker. She would end the threat posed by the Broker and Cerberus if it was the last thing she ever did. With the broker, it was merely business.

But with Cerberus, it was personal. Her left fist clenched, despite the bruising and her lips curled back in a snarl. She could understand Jack's hatred now. Only she wouldn't whine about it. She would end them. Two years of hell could not be repaid by simply robbing the organization blind. No, she would tear it apart, brick by brick, byte by byte, she would destroy their cells, end their projects and smile like a mad woman as she used a broadsword, or maybe a shotgun to remove the Illusive man's head.

A rogue thread tried to theorize what the blood spatter of such an action would cause as well as the pros and cons for each weapon, but she shut it down almost instantly. She straightened and staggered forward a step, swaying on her feet, the pain hanging over her like a shawl, but forcibly ignored. It was only now that she registered the gnawing hunger that her body was trying to inform her of.

She took another step forward, and another. Leaning heavily on the wall. She needed food, and she needed sleep. Her body still apparently carried such mortal failings. A thread helpfully brought up a map of the station and she drove her failing shell onward, looking for a place to get out of her Cerberus equipment and a safe place to hide. She dedicated a thread to finding these needs and she soon found herself nearing a block of apartments.

According to the security footage, there was no one home. The door lock presented her with no challenge, neither did the alarm. Both were of poor quality anyways. She stumbled to the bedroom and rummaged the closets. From what she could tell, this was the home of an Asari, lots of picture decorated the walls showing a smiling blue woman, some with other blue women and a few with her arms wrapped around a grizzled looking reptilian looking alien. She assumed that it was a Salarian. There was a collection of dresses and uniforms in the closet as well as some work out gear. She pulled out some pants and surprisingly a t-shirt as well as a jacket.

Hastily she ripped off the armour and uniform, keeping the boots from the uniform and throwing the Cerberus gear into the garbage incinerator that was apparently a mark of higher class on Omega. Dressed now in black slacks, dark blue shirt, black canvas jacket and white boots, she raided the fridge. There were some fruits and vegetables sitting next to an old cartridge of what appeared to be take out. She stole the fruits and cautiously nibbled on them.

A strange dark purple one that was shaped like a dragon fruit but with the skin like an apple was her favorite. It had a strange tangy sweetness that she liked. Her body accepted the offering's gratefully after the testing nibble didn't cause her body to swell up like a balloon. Sustained and a little more camouflaged she returned to the street. Second step was getting her hands on a weapon. On a place like Omega she knew it was only a matter of time before she ran across someone trying to fleece closed her eyes and took a deep breath, bringing in all her threads to focus. If she was going to survive even a day in Omega she needed to do one of three things:

one- make herself useful to someone in power, essentially turning herself into someone's pet A.I., She didn't like that option.

Two- start selling information that she could get, but that would draw attention she didn't want to herself.

Three- hide in the streets, gathering money and experience, but that had the possibility of her getting shanked in her sleep.

She sighed and prioritized. First a weapon and some cash, then food and safe place to rest, then plan. Course of action laid out she made her way through to the main plaza of Omega, if she was going to do anything then she needed stuff. A Batarian forced his way past her and she felt a flash of awareness from his Omni-tool. An Idea formed in her mind and she smiled. The next person that neared her she stumbled to the side, brushing against him.

It was a Turian who snarled at her and backhanded her across the face. The blow snapped her head to the side and forced her to stumble away, her whole body protested the abuse and she knew that her face would be joining the left side of her body in it's colourful state. But in that crucial half second she had accessed his accounts, and in a moment of spite she drained them all. That would teach him to beat on unarmed non-combatants.

She gingerly rested her hand againt the side of her face and winced at the pain that covered it as she continued on her way.

With the Turian's credits in her stolen Omni-tool she entered the plaza and began to purchase the essentials for herself. After a long argument with a Salarian vendor who she knew had tried to fleece her for the omni-tool she was attempting to get so she could ditch the Cerberus issue one currently adorning her arm she turned her attention to a food vendor and bought some ration packs and water.

Food taken care of she visited a nearby weapons merchant. She didn't have much left but enough to purchase a knife that she quickly attached to her person. With what little credits she had left she found a fabric vendor tucked away in a corner of the plaza. There wasn't much, a few bolts of low quality textiles and some sewing materials for the hobbyists or the poor. She bought three metres of a dark grey, linen like materiel and the required tools before she retreated into the bowels of Omega. After a hike through the darker and unoccupied halls, she found herself an abandoned nook situated high in a wall near the end of a low-quality neighbourhood.

It was high and hard to reach, but enough for her needs. Her body protested as she used one of her downloads to run the twelve feet up the wall, latching onto the ledge with weary fingers and labouriously hauling herself up. The nook was more of a ledge near a heat vent with a bend that protected her from prying eyes. In the near dark, she separated her haul into sections, the rations and food were carefully stored under a piece of wall she pried off with her new knife.

The omni-tool was set to the left and the cloth was folded neatly, awaiting her attention. She took a ration bar and ate it in five quick bites, the dry and tasteless bar doing its job. Finally, she turned her attention to the omi-tool from the station, examining it for the first time in detail. She didn't need an omni tool per say, the augments in the back of her head allowed her to interface with any wireless system within a four-kilometre radius, but it was a good prop, and she needed something for when wireless didn't work.

She closed her eyes and dove into its coding, sifting through the coding. It was rather like sifting though a tray of tangled jewelry, trying to separate the amber beads from the silver chains without breaking either. Her eyes snapped open and she swore violently, her mind crushing every program on the tool, the feeling of programs snapping like stepping of glass shards in her head. There was a tracking program on the tool.

She should have known! Should have guessed, she had the entirety of Cerberus' policies in her head! She knew how they operated! How had she not thought of the fact that they tracked everything they owned.

Frantic now she threw the unusable tool away from her and into the vent. It clanged against the sides of the shaft as it fell. Panic not subsiding she pulled all her threads inward and began to examine the hardware in her own body and the programing in her mental augments. It was agonizing, having all her thought threads focused on one thing. She was not meant to focus this utterly. The clarity and speed of her mind had increased exponentially but she had to close her eyes as the thread in charge of that function was drawn in as well.

The only ones not active were the ones focused on her breathing and heart, she made a mental side not to form an automatic process for that before she returned to her task. The sheer amount of tech within her was frightening. Her brain alone had hardware grafted onto it, no doubt to allow her mental faculties to be so super charged. A transceiver near the base of her skull allowed her to mesh with nearby systems.

Muscle grafts, bone grafts, monitors and hormone production centers littered her body, she could literally flush the blood from her body and the implants would stimulate her to make more. She shivered at the though of Cerberus having the coding for her implants, the last thing she needed was some enterprising hacker turning her blood to formaldehyde, because that's what one could do. With her entire mind focused on it she began to sift through her own programing, desperate to find any backdoors that could lead to her death.

From the records she had copied into the hard rive that lived near her heart she could see that she had been designed to have no personality, the stimulus sessions had been in an attempt to get her programing to link up with the body they had put it in. She was meant to be a human drone, a downloadable personality, the perfect sleeper agent, unknowing of its true purpose until activated, unfeeling, unmoving and implacable.

She shuddered and thanked whatever deity that existed here or in the multiverse for giving her, her memories. With a mind and morals controlling her intellect she had thrown a wrench into the plans, filling the personality void that would have been held by the control chip. It was an intense and painful process as she had to carefully skirt and sift through her own mental codes looking for errors, locks and backdoors.

She found several, including a transmitter and a vital sign monitor and a Deadman switch that sent an active signal to somewhere. She dared not track it for now. Her back muscles cramped and her head felt hot as she dug through her core. She needed to insulate herself, protect her mind from invasion. She would not be a puppet. She wove new firewalls, hid the functions of her implants, diverted threads to building new programs and having them perform quick switches that reminded her of Indiana Jones switching statues on pressure plates.

She was knocked from her efforts by a migraine that felt like her brain was seconds away from pouring out of her nose, but she was only half done. She had managed to deactivate the tackers but she still was a long way from being shielded completely. Shaking her head, she tried to focus her threads inward to finish the process, but she was knocked out by the pain and a warning from her neural implants that continued action would liquefy her brain.

She wearily glanced at her internal clock and saw that she had been at it for over six hours. Exhausted, she lay down and placed her head on the fabric, letting her eyes droop shut as her body shut down to recuperate. Her mental threads drifted free along the lines of code until she wearily drew them together to prevent them from wandering out into the Extranet. She set them loose among a long list of calculations that they could play with for however long she was unconscious. Finally, for the first time sine she became aware, she slept.

* * *

Miranda Lawson stalked into the Illusive man's main office. It wasn't often that she was summoned to the inner sanctum like this, but she wasn't one to question. The door slid open before her and the black tiles reflected her image back at her like a pool of black water. The baleful light of the star this station orbited filled the room with its fiery light. Causing the black tiles to glow. The effect of black and red made the room look almost hellish.

He sat at his screen, his back to the door and an ever-present cigarette between his fingers. A wisp of smoke curled lazily into the air, vanishing into the dark void that was the high ceiling. "Miranda, so good of you to come" he greeted her without turning, his voice soft and somehow still menacing.

"I came here as soon as I could" she informed him stoically, taking a stance near him and joining him in his observation of the star.

"A situation has arisen that requires action" he informed her. She nodded and waited for him to continue, he would speak when he was ready and not one second before. "Tell me Miranda, what do you know of project Mnemosyne?" he asked her in an almost off handed manner, but her boss never did anything casually.

She looked over at him and blinked, surprise flickering in her sky-blue eyes. "I've never heard of that project, was it in a briefing?" she asked, wondering if she had missed some crucial data. The Illusive man shook his head and took a pull from his cigarette.

"No, but it's good to know that my security is still tight on that front. However, Muse station, where Project Mnemosyne is located has gone dark" he informed her as he exhaled a cloud of smoke through his nose. With an almost absent air he tapped the cancer stick, knocking the ash clinging to the tip into a crystal ash tray near his elbow. He waved his free hand and a console near him activated.

"I want you to follow this frequency and recover Subject Metis, preferably still operable" he told her calmly.

"Who or what is subject Metis?" Miranda questioned as her omni-tool pinged. "A significant investment Miranda, that is all you need to know. It looks like a human female, but don't be fooled. If subject Metis is the reason Muse station went dark, then you will be dealing with a very deadly opponent" he replied sharply.

Miranda looked down at the files that loaded onto her tool. "It says here that Metis is on Omega" she noted and the Illusive man nodded. "That is correct, our normal agents can't handle this, they don't have the training to take Metis out."

Miranda nodded in understanding and turned to leave. "And Miranda. If Metis proves too hard to capture, terminate, but don't destroy its head" he told her smoothly.

She paused "understood" she replied before continuing her exit.

* * *

A/n- I'm glad some people like this, right now this is still a newly forming idea, please review and tell me what you think! do you like Athena so far? is there potential in this? I'm currently enjoying writing her, but that could just be the exam stress talking.

Safe travels my fellow readers and writers. Trojan Seeress


	3. Trapped

**Trapped!**

There is no day, or night on Omega. Merely cycles of sleeping and waking dictated by an arbitrary light cycle on a rock that orbits a furnace and happens to carry sentient creatures trillions of lightyears away. Athena's eyes snapped open and she sat upright with a gasp of shock that morphed into a moan of pain. She trembled as she fought her way free of the clinging memory fragments that had haunted her resting mind, lingering phantom pains, substituted by her memory stands reminded her of the torture from the lab.

They resisted her attempts like thick cobwebs, sticking to her with cruel tenacity. Tears stained her face and shuddering gasps wrenched her already pained muscles further, she shivered in the warm air of the vent that blew past her and felt sobs build in her throat. She let them out but immediately regretted it as the actions made the pain worse. Her body ached all the way to her bones, and the dull throb of a migraine pulsed across the top of her head.

Slowly she calmed, breathing deeply through her nose as she forced her body to cease its fear. Once still, she cautiously lifted her shirt and stared at the mottled bruises that decorated her side from shoulder to ankle. Her ribs groaned in protest and though the crack in her rib as slowly sealing itself, it still hurt like a white-hot needle. She shook her head gingerly in an attempt to clear it and marshalled her threads together to finish her purge of her systems. She swore that until her mind and body were her own, she would not leave her lair. It was no easier than it had been to begin with; still beyond painful to focus her mind on her task.

Errant thoughts tried to escape, one even attempted to calculate Pi before she caught it and dragged it back into the fire. Time passed but she focused her mind on her task. The final signal that wasn't her own to command was the Deadman switch. She deactivated it with an almost childlike glee before she set to crafting a set of electronic armour that would encase her hackable systems.

She established programs upon programs. Firewalls upon firewalls. Redundancies for her redundancies. Tripwires and traps. Her mind was hers. No one would take it from her. No one would turn her into a glorified sock puppet. She was her own person. She assigned a thread to monitor her defenses, carefully locking it into place. The thread rebelled at becoming stationary but she remained implacable. Eventually it bowed to her will and took up sentry upon the walls that would protect her. She opened her eyes and stretched out cramped muscles that had locked, hissing in discomfort as her bruises protested.

She shook out her hands to loosen them, biting her cheek as her left arm pulled. Her threads fanned out with a sense of relief as they once again took up monitoring her surroundings. It felt like stretching one's limbs after being locked into a tight, confining position for to long. The pain of her migraine eased but did not vanish completely. Her back relaxed a little as the burning pain faded and her breathing became easier.

She leaned back against the wall next to the vent before she pulled the folded grey fabric to her and shook it out, laying the bolt out flat. She had some patterns in her head that she needed to help with her flight from Cerberus. Carefully she took out the razor cutter and after finding and downloading some patterns, began to cut. Hours later her threads alerted her, Cerberus was on this station, and they were looking for her.

Beggars were being shaken down covertly, agents were searching the station, she folded herself into her nook even tighter when an armoured figure stomped under her hiding place, his comm chatter telling her they were searching for her. She had no choice now, she'd never survive on this station without help. She felt angry at having yet another choice stolen from her. She hissed out a breath in frustration before she began composing a message.

* * *

Miranda docked her shuttle on Omega and disembarked with her usual regal stalk. The first thing she needed to do was triangulate her prey's location. The files Identified Subject Metis as a human female, 179.8 cm in height, 177.6 kilograms in weight, black shaved hair, grey eyes and if she could track them, enough implants in its body to outfit either a starship, or a platoon of alliance marines. She read through the files that had been sent to her and fought off a frown.

Project Mnemosyne brought back disturbing memories of her own childhood. Of sneaking into her fathers on site laboratory and seeing the dozens of embryos floating in clear tanks filled with clear fluid. For a moment, she could smell the harsh, clean smell of antiseptic and hear the faint gurgle of the tanks. She shook the memory away and focused again on her task. It was unclear how Metis had made it to Omega station. According to the reports, Metis had been unresponsive since its download. Only the fact that it had shown a consistent low level of brain activity beyond that of a coma patient had saved the subject from termination.

She ignored the beggars and the poverty stricken who shied away from her in fear. Agents had been combing the station for the last seven hours with no results, it was time for her to go to a highest power there was. Aria. Queen of Omega. The throbbing bass of afterlife mixed with the flashing lights that decorated the club's façade. The Elcor at the door looked at her with apathy in his flat face.

"Tell Aria that Miranda Lawson would like to speak with her at her earliest convenience" Miranda informed him in a polite but bland tone. The Elcor looked at her with little expression of his heavy face as he relayed to message into his omni-tool.

Miranda took up and easy stance to wait for the Queen's answer. "Confused: you may enter. Cautiously: she seemed interested" the heavy alien told her. She nodded graciously and stepped through the heavy doors into the fire lined entry hall. Her strides were smooth and practiced as she entered the neon lit cavern that was afterlife. Her ribs shuddered in concert with the techno music that blared from every corner and her eyes blinked rapidly to adjust to the strobing neon and shadows that filled the club.

Dancers gyrated above the heads of patrons and the smell of sweat and alcohol filled the air. Miranda ignored the patrons with icy regality as she headed for the steps that lead to Aria's throne. The guards scanned her for weapons and she reluctantly parted with her pistol, knowing she would go no further until it had been removed.

"So what brings the Illusive Man's personal bitch to my station?" Aria queried as Miranda came into view. The queen was sprawled languidly across the leather couch that was her throne, one of the lines painted on in a facsimile of eyebrows raising in curiosity.

Miranda grit her teeth, ignoring the slur and smiled politely at the Asari. "An asset of ours has somehow made its way to your station. I am here to collect it" she replied, still standing.

Aria snorted "asset huh? So another crazy test subject of yours decided that it would rather not suffer under your tender mercy did it?" she a guessed and Miranda held back the urge to sneer at the Asari.

"Perhaps, or perhaps it was stolen by defectors" she answered coolly.

Aria didn't look convinced. "I can keep an eye out for you Cerberus, but it will cost you" she told the agent smugly.

Miranda met her eyes squarely "How much for a cursory look" she asked in a businesslike tone.

"Fifty thousand up front as a fee for asking, another hundred for any information. Non-refundable" was the answer.

Miranda withheld a scowl at the obviously inflated price, "twenty-five thousand now, fifty on delivery" she countered and Aria smirked. "Listen Cerberus. I don't like you. I don't like your organization and I most certainly don't like your boss. Therefore, as a fine for inciting my dislike. fifty thousand upfront. Non-negotiable." Miranda grit her teeth and felt her manicured nails dig into the palm of her finger-less gloves.

"Fine, fifty thousand" she acquiesced, lifting her omni-tool and transferring the money to the waiting crime queen. Aria's omni-tool flared as the transaction was accepted and Aria's smirk grew. "Pleasure doing business Cerberus. Now give me a description of what I'm looking for" she commanded, gesturing to the opposite end of the L shaped couch. Miranda sat stiffly.

"The subject is a human female, dark hair, that is most likely shaved, grey eyes, 1.79 meters in height. Arrived on this station within the last twenty-four hours. There is a chance that they are a coma patient. If the subject is conscious then it is imperative that we retrieve it" she told Aria succinctly.

The queen's eyebrow raised again "that's not a whole lot to go off of Cerberus and you know it. Off the top of my head I can think of six human females that mach similar descriptions, and those are just some of the girls that work for me" she gestured down to a small stage where a scantily clad human female gyrated for the viewing pleasure of the assembled patrons. Miranda didn't let her disgust show on her face.

"But one that arrived that recently?" she pressed and Aria snorted. "It takes a little longer than twenty-four hours for me to know about a new arrival" she told the agent.

"Bullshit" Miranda informed her coldly, leaning forward.

"True. All I can give you Cerberus is a few eye witnesses that tell me that a small shuttle exploded against the side of my station a day ago. Search the records and you get nothing. That's all I have for you." The Asari told her with a shrug before she turned away in clear dismissal and looked out over her domain. Miranda realized that she wouldn't get any more from the queen, and stood, leaving the private booth and collecting her weapons from the guard.

As she left the she caught a glimpse of a heavy set Turian guard escorting a tall, painfully thin female clad in a dark jacket, dark pants with a heavy grey hood that wrapped around the shoulders and attached on the right breast with a simple metal clasp. Their lower face was shrouded in a long tapered veil of the same materiel fell well past their chin. This was not an unusual thing on omega, where one's face could be used against them, what caught her attention was that the woman was subtly limping, favouring their left side in a way that only a trained professional would notice.

Her eyes continued to catalogue the petitioner but stalled on the white boots that she instantly recognized as standard issue Cerberus. She blinked and did a double take. She looked up to see the hood turned in her direction before they looked away and continued up the stairs. A wave of the guards omi-tool cleared her of weapons and she vanished up to Aria's throne. A hunch told her to stick around so she ordered a drink at the bar and settled herself at a table, watching for the hooded woman.

* * *

Athena was nervous, though her body didn't show it. There were too many things happening for her to keep track of, even with her augmented brain. The hood/veil combo hid her face well and didn't stand out too much among the other residents who hid their faces on this station, but she still felt self conscious.

The Turian leading her pushed through the crowd and she followed quietly in his wake. Movement out of the corner of her eye drew her attention to a human woman in a tight white cat suit with dark hair. Her heart felt like it wanted to begin hammering, but she stopped that. Immediately several threads latched onto the woman's appearance and confirmed what she already knew. Miranda Lawson was on Omega, and she was Looking straight at Athena. She forced her body to move smoothly, refusing to show her fear in anyway. All her programs were now on high alert and three were working their way into the brunette's omni tool already.

All recordings involving her were being erased the Nano-second she was caught, making her invisible to electronic eyes. If only she could do that for biological ones as well. She held herself perfectly still as she stood before the queen of omega, the Asari looked at her with curiosity and a small smirk.

"Well it's not everyday I get a message on my personal account requesting a meeting with someone I don't know. That makes me wonder, what do you want?" the queen asked her with a raised eyebrow.

Athena nodded her head once before answering "I have a skill, you have the market, one could hope to pool these resources together to make a profit" she answered and Aria looked her over. "And just what is this skill you hope to sell?" she asked, still covered in a façade of apathy.

Athena met her gaze squarely, even though she knew her eyes were still hidden. "I am a hacker. One of the best." Her voice was soft, little more than a whisper, but she knew that Aria had heard.

"Really? If I had a credit for every time I hear someone is the best in their field when they are trying to get a job, I could buy the Citadel" Aria's voice was mocking, but Athena held her ground. "Tell me right here right now to retrieve something and I can do. A taste of my capabilities" she offered and Aria snorted in disdain before waving her hand in a dismissive gesture.

"Fine, I want to see what message Tevos received this morning in her personal account" she declared. Athena brought her left arm up, activating her omni-tool that now glowed blue and began to hack. The omni-tool was mostly for show, as she was connecting through it to get the information. She dove a conglomerate of threads into the extra-net in search of what she needed. Surprisingly she was able to piggyback her way into the Citadel through Aria's private account.

From there she simply slithered through the firewalls and security systems like a ghost. The message was found and copied before she pulled the threads back to her body; the three working on Miranda informed her of the spy program that was installed on the agent and returned to monitoring all surrounding information. Her fingers were still typing with a furious speed that made it look like she was working from her device, she waited a few minutes longer, prolonging it out to ten minutes, above average for a hacker, but well below her top speed.

"Message, sent at 0730 this morning. From: Aria T'loak, To: Tevos. Subject: again. Main message: Hey girl, last week was great, can't wait for your next "business meeting" on Illum. Let me know so I an book the shuttle." She read in a monotone that was strangely frightening.

Aria's eyes widened and she looked at the guards at the top of the stairs, but they hadn't heard. "How did you get that?" she demanded, a small pistol appearing in her hand. Athena didn't even twitch as she observed the weapon and the Asari holding it. "I am very good at what I do Aria. I am offering my services as an excellent hacker. All I ask for a salary, and protection from those who would hurt me. In return I work for you as a private contractor."

Aria stared at her. "And just who would I be protecting you from?" she asked cautiously.

"Everyone else." Athena told her simply. Aria stared at her in curiosity that slowly morphed into a look of understanding.

"Would you happen to be trying to hide from a certain illusive gentleman?" she asked and Athena felt another spike of fear. "Because they have already been by asking if I'd seen their latest escapee. Female, tall, and I bet money if I pulled the hood and veil off I'd find dark hair and grey eyes" Aria's smile was borderline malicious and Athena felt a stab of pure terror. "I wonder how much they'd be willing to pay, when they were willing to shell out fifty thousand just to ask me to look." The Asari mused and Athena knew that she had miscalculated, miscalculated badly.

* * *

Aria smirked to herself at how still the figure before her had become. She stood and smoothly stalked toward her prey, looking for all the world like a cat preparing to torture the mouse it had between its paws. She reached out her right hand and using only one finger tilted the brim of the hood back, exposing the top half of the girl's face to the light of the club.

The eyes that stared back at her were downright unnatural. No eyes should be that colour of metallic silver, or that clearly patterned with the stark black line that rimmed the iris. The soul behind the eyes showed stark terror that she didn't seem to be able to hide despite her statue imitation. In fact, Aria could barely see if the woman was breathing. "So, what do you think you can offer me that would be worth more than what Cerberus is willing to offer hmm?" she purred as her finger drifted down to the veil that shielded the rest of the girl's face.

"You already know what I can do, that is all I can offer. Is it wrong to not want to be tortured daily for absolutely no reason other then the scientist who own you decide to see how many dols of pain a mind can withstand when they body is not being damaged?" the trapped woman asked in a flat monotone.

The dead voice and the numb look that was appearing in her eyes pointed to experience in that area. Aria let a smirk dominate her face even as she felt disgust at Cerberus. "I'll let you stay girl. But remember. You now belong to me" she told her newest pet. She didn't even twitch at this statement and Aria withdrew her finger from the veil, leaving it in place. Gloved fingers reached up and tugged the hood back over her face.

Aria returned to her throne and looked at her newest acquisition. "So do you have a name girl?" The girl didn't react for a moment before she bowed her head "Neith" she replied quietly in defeat.

* * *

A/N- Athena miscalculated. The thing is, though she is smarter than the entire population of afterlife combined, she does not have practical experience. She went to aria at the wrong time because if she had been there before Miranda, then she would have been safe. I also hope this puts any fears of OP Athena to rest. Her hacker name of Neith is after the Egyptian goddess of the same name, who is the early Egyptian goddess of war, hunting, weaving and Wisdom. Its another appropriate name for Athena an mentions how she was made for war and describes her mind as threads. Athena is the queen of the obscure and strange references, so I am digging deep into my store of useless knowledge for this story. Please review, and I am still looking for a beta.

Safe travels, Trojan Seeress


	4. Servatude

**Servitude**

Miranda watched as the hooded woman left Aria's throne. They exhibited no physical tells as to how her meeting had gone, nor did she look around in suspicion. The Turian guard escorted her to the door and Miranda calmly stood, leaving her nearly untouched drink on the table a followed the woman at a discreet distance. The Turian pointed at something down the plaza and send something to the woman's omni-tool, which glowed a customized sapphire when she activated it.

With a nod to the guard she turned and walked away, weaving through the crowds. Miranda followed the hooded woman, careful to not loose sight of her but not so close as to be discovered. The woman walked calmly through the streets, seeming to be intent on der destination. Miranda didn't believe it for a second. No one could afford to relax on Omega, not even Aria.

It was when they were deep in the maze of hallways, passages, ducts and narrow corridors that the woman suddenly broke into a fast sprint, surprising Miranda and everyone else around her. Miranda threw subtlety to the wind and sprinted after her. The woman wove and dodged, then suddenly, she was gone.

"Dammit!" Miranda swore as she scanned her surroundings. She searched every nook and cranny over that stretch where she had vanished, hacking into the station's cameras to find what rout the woman had taken, but nothing. It was if she had never existed.

She ran her hand through her dark hair in frustration and wrote in her report. She had stumbled on someone with some ties to Cerberus, those boots were standard Cerberus, but whether the person was a betrayer or had simply bought them off the black market, she couldn't tell. Either way, the woman had given her the slip. She ground her teeth at that though before she turned back and headed to the upper levels where one of her safe houses was located. She had been ordered to search the station, and by god she would.

* * *

Athena hardly dared breath as Miranda stalked past her hiding place. She had crammed herself into a small nook and pulled the panel next to it over her, holding it in place. She watched as the Cerberus operative searched her immediate area before making frustrated gestures and leaving.

She followed her through the cameras until she saw Miranda enter into what was her safe house on omega. Certain now her surroundings were clear she pushed the panel away and stepped out. She straightened her veil and strode calmly on a roundabout rout back to her nook. Aria had apparently given her a safe house to live from but Athena trust that woman enough to to live under that her roof.

She had already fallen into that Asari's trap once, now she could at least hold what little autonomy she had left. Her hood had and veil at least had saved her from having her face entered into a facial recognition system, and covering the face was not uncommon on this station.

In a fit of whimsy she had modeled her face veil after Zeratul's from StarCraft and her hood after Leliana's from dragon age inquisition. This made her look like even more of a nerd, but since she was already in the nerdiest of situations she may as well play her part to the hilt.

She settled back in her little nest and brought out her omni-tool. Aria had given her a list of things to do for her new job, so she might as well do it. Afterwards she might take a chance and explore this station properly. After all she needed to begin making contacts and feed money into what she had dubbed her "reaper" fund. She would need clothes, armour and weapons as well as the muscle memory to use them.

Having the downloads meant that she could be incredibly deadly, but she had to devote runtimes to movements. Though she had not real sub conscious to speak of her body still processed memory the same way, meaning that she should theoretically be able to develop muscle memory and the muscles to pull off whatever stunt she needed. Her omni-tool pinged and she opened the message function with a flick.

It was from Aria. Apparently the crime queen wanted her to forge a firearms license for one of her agents on the citadel. She sighed and leaned back before she began what was a new step in her life.

* * *

 **Two months since arrival**

Athena gasped as she applied pressure to the bullet wound in her side. She had thought that Aria would have her doing desk work. Apparently not. The Crime Queen had decided that a hands-on approach was the best course of action. This meant that she was sneaking in and out of places that were not friendly to anyone on good terms with Aria. Now here she was, folded up in a small cranny in the depths of Omega, curled around an OSD in an inner pocket while she tried to keep herself from bleeding out.

She swore violently as she applied medi-gel. Honestly, what was the point of having the entirety of medical knowledge either crammed into her brain or at her metaphorical fingertips when it did little to help her in stopping the blood flow. The miracle of modern science expanded around the bullet hole, slowly sealing and anesthetizing the area. Out of immediate danger she leaned her head back against the bulkhead and let out a long breath.

This entire mess had happened because she had grown cocky. Being able to hack into anything and everything had caused her to completely disregard what she saw around her. After all what could her organic eyes discern that was not already glaringly obvious to the security systems or the station schematics? She had forgotten that the world did not fall into neat little boxes that could be labelled and place on a shelf.

It had seemed like such a simple snatch and run. Walk in, take the OSD card, walk out. The locks were barely even child's play to her and the security had almost caused her to laugh it was so loose. What she hadn't noticed with her electronic eyes was the removed panel in a corner of the room that concealed a gunman.

The entire thing was a trap, set to get either a high ranking lackey to Aria, or any form of useful tool. Unfortunately for her she had simply glossed over that fact. Now here she was, hiding once again in the bowls of Omega, only this time she had a bullet wound in her right side.

Nothing vital had been hit and the round had gone clean through. But the scar would remain, and it bloody well hurt. She closed her eyes for a moment and simply let the darkness of her hiding place and the subtle thrum of the life support sooth her. Her growing hair itched a little from lack of washing and the veil felt uncomfortably warm in this confined place, but she didn't dare take them off.

Miranda had left the station for now, but Athena was absolutely sure that Cerberus still had their eyes on Omega, ready to pounce should she make an appearance. She gently thudded her head against the bulkhead to refocus her wandering subroutines.

First things first, get the data to Aria. Next she needed gear. Best case scenario would be her kitting herself out with custom gear made to her own nerdy standards, Sci fi presented her with such a fabulous array of technology and looks to choose from. It would be wasteful if she didn't reap the bounty of such imagination after all.

She sighed deeply again and pushed herself off the wall and heaved herself upright. With a heavy heart, she began to reroute her threads in charge of credit skimming to the more important section of gear conception, leaving only a handful of programs in place to continue, but without an active thread to direct them she couldn't scoop nearly as much.

Now more or less standing under her own power she slipped out of her hiding place and began to make her way to Afterlife.

* * *

 **Three months since Arrival**

Athena stared down at the body that lay in front of her with a numb detachment. She had never killed anyone up close before, and now she stood in the center of what had been a low-level meeting of a rival had wanted them silenced, and what Aria demanded, Athena had to give.

It astounded her how easy it had been. All she had to do was cut the lights, pull her knife and get to work. Barriers did little against blades and her newly crafted blade based off the Hunter design from Destiny had done its job perfectly.

On another note, Cerberus had outdone themselves on her training downloads. There hadn't been a single moment of hesitation as she moved through the deep black and murdered every one of them. This terrified her. How could she have killed seven people so flawlessly? Did she truly have any control over her downloads?

When she had killed the scientists, she hadn't really thought about the fact that she was causing just wanted the pain to stop. Now though she was covered in the blood of her victims.

She began to tremble; her hands shook and the knife fell from her now unresponsive fingers. She took a shaky step to the right and began to dry heave, what little there was in her stomach making a violent comeback. Her body was rebelling at the realization at what she had done. Tears poured down her face as she finally grasped what she had become. She was a murderer, and a slave.

She was locked under Aria's thumb with no real way of getting out. The moment she ran she knew that Aria would have no qualms in setting Cerberus after her. Not to mention that she couldn't see Aria reacting well to her "Generosity" being thrown back at her.

Athena stumbled back to her knife, driving her body forward to pick up the blade. There could be no evidence linking her to this massacre. With the blood slicked handle now gripped tightly in her shaking hand she forced the door open and slipped away into the shadows.

That was the first night she made use of the apartment Aria had given her. She stood under the jets in the shower, frantically scrubbing her skin as she tried to clean off the blood. Her clothes were in the washer, and her knife had been cleaned and set aside for now.

A hysterical laugh bubbled in her throat as she scrubbed "out damn spot, out I say" she sobbed as she continued to clean her already clean skin. It was turning red from the abuse but she couldn't stop. The smell lingered in her nose, coating the inside with the sickeningly sweet and metallic scent of blood.

She continued to spot tiny flecks of it under her nails, on the back of her forearm. It was now that Lady Macbeth's monologue made sense to her.

When she had read it, she had though she knew what it meant. But now she truly understood. The dirty feeling that haunted her soul, that made her obsessively scrub and scratch at her already raw skin. Three threads began to point out her irrational behavior, a self preservation subroutine reared its head and knocked on her inner self hard, throwing her concentration from her attempt to flay herself alive. She sank down to the floor, clutching her knees under the scalding spray of water, and wept.

* * *

The next two weeks were not ones she was proud of. Not that she was proud of her first three months anyway, but truly she was in need of some kind of release. The fear and tension of her imprisonment and subsequent escape, mixed with her first frantic months on Omega, she had no way to escape. Now she had turned to the tried and true method of forgetting, only to be cheated out of alcoholic oblivion.

That's not to say she didn't try, but one thing she could say in favour of Cerberus. They built their products well. Even if she was defective in their eyes, she was still very well built. This included her super liver and advanced metabolism. Not even Krogan Ryncol could touch her.

She slumped forward and rested her forehead on the table, a shadow of a sob itching at the back of her throat. Several threads noted that an Asari was approaching her table and she tensed a little before relaxing again, completely apathetic to the alien.

She heard the soft swish of a dress as the Asari sat down. "Hey, you alright?" a kind voice asked her.

"Why do you care?" she asked, her voice empty of all emotion.

"Because this is the second week that you've been here every day, drank an inordinate amount of alcohol that would kill a normal human and left without so much as a stagger. I know what someone attempting to drink until their brains pour out their noses, and you are a prime example of just that" the Asari noted.

"I should be so lucky" Athena mumbled into the table, harshly shoving a handful of wayward threads back into their original projects as they tried to giver a list of suicide options.

"Here" the Asari said suddenly, standing and walking around to Athena's chair. Before she could do more than blink the woman had hauled her to her feet and was now escorting her from the club.

"Where are you taking me?" Athena asked listlessly, not truly caring. She may not be drunk, but she could just cease to care.

"My apartment" was the only answer she got. Acknowledging the answer but not really caring anymore Athena retreated into her mind, ignoring the outside feeds. At the moment, she wouldn't have even stirred herself if the Asari held a knife to her throat.

"We're here" the Asari told her, pushing Athena onto a small couch. She felt her back hit the cushions but payed it no mind. She had been numb for the last two weeks, and it didn't look like she would be waking anytime soon.

"Ok, I don't know what's going on in that head of yours but you obviously have some problems that you need to get through. So talk" the Asari told her irritably. Athena blinked and looked up at the Asari standing over her.

"Why are you trying to help me?" Athena asked curiously and the Asari let out a loud sigh. "Because someone helped me when I was in a similar place. I don't know what happened to you, but I know the look of someone who is haunted. So I'm trying to pass on a favour, I though you humans were such big fans of Paying it forward" Athena blinked at the Asari before cocking her head, examining the Asari in front of her.

She was tall, dark blue skin with lighter teal face paint. Her eyes were a bright purple and there was an air about her of someone who had lived hard despite her reletively young looking face. A thread set itself to running a search on the Asari's face and she sighed, leaning forward and putting her head in her hands. "I'm trapped here and Aria has decided that I make a good slave" she mumbled sadly, the truth of her situation still laying heavily on her shoulders.

"Why is that?" the Asari whom her search named Desta T'res asked softly. Athena inhaled deeply before she let it out gustily, may as well tell the truth. "I'm hunted, Aria can keep me safe but…" her voice cracked.

"But her definitions of safe tend to make you do things you would never want to?" Desta asked finished and Athena nodded. "I thought it would be simple. Act as a contracted agent, she pays me money, I deliver information. Two plus two equals four" She shook her head bitterly. "Except the people looking for me got there first and put the wind up. She knew they were looking for someone and then I fell into her lap. They offered an impressive amount of credits to get me, so she has me with the sword of Damocles over my head. He moment she decides I've outlive my usefulness. I'm gone. Shipped back off to whatever lab they decide would best benefit from me."

She paused to take a breath, and realized she had just babbled out to a complete stranger. "How old are you?" Desta asked gently sitting herself down carefully next to her. Athena paused at the question. Technically she was two years and three months. But she had been in her mid twenties when she had… died? She didn't even know what had happened to her. The memories of that walk home had never cleared up. For all she knew this could all be a hallucination and she was laying in a coma in some hospital right now.

But no, if this was a dream she wouldn't have reacted to those mercs' deaths as she had. She was learning things she never knew existed or could even imagine. "Twenty two" she finally answered weakly, still not looking up at Desta. A hand gently lay itself on her shoulder and she flinched, unused to the feeling of physical contact that didn't hurt.

"It's ok. You're safe here" Desta soothed, her hand rubbing gently along Athena's shoulder. Athena felt a sob build in her throat, her threads were useless. They simply continued away at their projects, though she was surpassing their input with a ruthless will. A feeling of desolation welled up in her chest and she let out a strangled sob, unable to hold it in any longer.

"Shh, its alright, cry" Desta told her, her hand still rubbing along Athena's shoulder. So she did just that. She curled forward, and cried. Great shuddering gasps as tears poured down from her eyes and were absorbed by her veil.

Arms wrapped around her as she cried, hugging her softly and soft sounds of comfort made her cry harder. All the pent up emotions inside her poured out as she grieved for herself, for her innocence and fear of what had happened and what would come. Eventually she succumbed to the blissfully numbing blackness of exhaustion.

* * *

She awoke an hour later to the smell of food. She cracked open an eye and stared around her at the unfamiliar surroundings. With a rush her threads informed her of what had happened and what they had monitored since she had fallen asleep.

She winced and looked around the apartment, looking for Desta. "You're awake, that good. Here" The Asari was standing in front of her, offering a mug of what looked like tea. She sat up and took it cautiously, watching the Asari as she walked back to her kitchenette and returned holding a plate of small dumplings.

"It's Thessian white tea. I promise" Desta told her calmly as she set down the plat on the coffee table and took a seat across from Athena, nursing her own mug of tea.

Athena considered the Asari before her before she made a choice. She quickly triple checked the apartment for bugs before she gingerly reached up and tugged her hood off. Her hair had grown a bit in the three months since her escape. It turns out she was correct, the hair was ink black and currently sat in short spikes from where the hood had ruffled it.

Then with a resolve that moved her even in the face of her anxiety she tugged at her veil, letting it fall around her neck. She waited as Desta looked her over, she felt naked without her veil, she almost never took it off, except to bathe. She even slept with it on. "You have beautiful eyes" Desta told her simply before turning her attention to the food.

She relaxed a little and hesitantly sipped her tea. It was good, similar but different to earth tea and almost minty in flavour. "I'm Desta T'res" Desta offered and Athena recognized it for what it was. An offering, a name for a name.

"Athena" she answered softly, looking down to watch the steam curl off her tea. "A nice name, does it mean anything?" Desta asked curiously and Athena shrugged. "She is the Ancient Greek goddess of Wisdom, War and Crafts. My parents liked their mythology" she answered, feeling a little bolder and looking up to meet Desta's eyes.

"Does Desta mean anything?" she asked and Desta laughed "don't know. Probably meant something in ancient times, but what ever it meant, its just a name now" she answered with a smile.

Athena found herself answering the gesture and cautiously reached out to take a dumpling. It was the first piece of hot food she'd had in three weeks. She didn't cook often, usually getting nutrient packs or buying from the more reputable eating establishments.

It felt nice. "So, you're working for Aria until you can get together enough money to escape and find somewhere safe?" Desta asked her and Athena felt herself freeze a little before she shook it off and answered.

"I have the money, but not the connections or the gear. I know I will never be safe from them as long as their organization exists so my only hope is to become dangerous enough that they wouldn't dare think of coming after me" she answered. She didn't know why she was trusting Desta, but it felt good to talk to someone other than Aria, or her contacts for once.

She hadn't realized just how lonely she was, her head was so full that she hadn't even though about how her normally gregarious nature would be affected. "I see, so what happened to drive you to Afterlife?" Desta asked after a moment of silence.

"Aria decided that apparently a hacker is also a good assassin, she seemed to think the exercise would do me good" Athena spat bitterly. Desta looked at her with eyes filled with understanding.

"How many?" she questioned and Athena bowed her head "seven" she answered shamefully.

"Did you have a choice?" Desta asked her and Athena's head shot up. "Of course I had a choice!" she raged before the fight drained out of her "there's always a choice" she added more quietly.

"Not always" Desta told her firmly, meeting Athena's gaze squarely. "I could have chosen to not do it, or run, or warned them. Instead I walked in there and killed them in the dark" Athena protested, but Desta shook her head.

"This is omega. Aria would have known. And truthfully, you won't survive if you shy from killing" she told Athena firmly. Athena's shoulders slumped again, she knew that logically. But to do it was another thing entirely.

"How do you cope with it?" she asked in defeat and Desta shrugged "we each have our own ways. But you have to remember. Aria may own you now. But if you do it right, then you can be free." Athena looked down at her tea again and nodded. "I'd like to be free" she murmured in agreement

* * *

 **Four months after arrival**

Miranda snarled in fury and punched the wall next to her in frustration. Another dead end. What's more, Aria now refused to see her. Demanding that Miranda communicate through an intermediary, a hacker named Neith.

She had never met Neith in person, or even heard their voice but they were at the very least efficient. Neith had also agreed to field searches for Metis on their own time for a modest fee. Miranda gladly paid the price for the information, even if it had resulted in her chasing the damned subject across most of the Terminus system. She had to give Metis credit, she could move. And she was good.

Only the barest hint of a presence on board ships, a fleeting picture in a Nano second of recording. Currently she was on Illium hunting though the various information brokers for another hint of a clue, one that had resulted in a firefight with Eclipse, two dead agents on her side and no new information regarding Metis. Her omni-tool pinged and she lifted it to answer the video call.

"Ms. Lawson" the distorted voice greeted her "Neith" she answered. The shadowy figure nodded to her.

"As of this moment your target has gone underground. I will keep you informed if I hear anything more, but she has been learning. Its been harder and harder to track her each time. I am sorry Ms. Lawson, but I believe that unless your target wants to be found now then I can do very little for you" Miranda restrained the urge to curse and nodded in understanding.

"I see. Thank you for your assistance. Perhaps I will call on you again" she thanked them with a sigh. "A pleasure doing business with you Ms. Lawson. Have a pleasant day" The call ended and she swore, violently as she sank down on the couch. Back to the drawing board.

* * *

Athena sighed behind her veil as she ended the call. It had been a stroke of luck when Aria had decided it would be funny for Athena to help her captors search for her, but god alive was it nerve wracking. The Queen certainly like her irony, evil woman. She stood from the pile of crates that occupied the small storeroom she had commandeered for that call and straightened her hood. With her new income, she was able to begin purchasing clothes and gear.

As witnessed by the black, civilian grade chest plate she was now sporting over a pale grey long sleeved shirt. Over this was a new jacket made of dark grey leather. Her entire outfit was now very in various shades grey, black and silver. Her leggings were dark charcoal with a pair of pistols strapped to her thighs and her knife, which she was contemplating making a duplicate of for tight melee combat.

She had dumped the Cerberus boots, despite their wonderful arch support and all weather rating after reading Miranda's report of noticing her boots. Now she wore sturdy black boots that buckled up the front with dull silver buckles. Black gloves covered her hands and her omni-tool was returned to its boring orange (oh how she loathed that colour).

All in all, she looked absolutely forgettable. Also, she was dressed in a colour that worked beautifully in the dimly lit corridors of omega. The varying gradients of grey and black made her uninteresting because a solid colour usually denoted some form of affiliation. People noticed someone dressed all in black, but this outfit allowed her to fade into the shadows of her new home. It had been a month since Desta T'res had pulled her out of Afterlife, now she only went there to deliver goods to her boss.

The Asari had given her a much needed confidant, and they now kept in touch. Occasionally they would meet for tea and talk about normal things, or griped about how badly their day had gone. Desta was a freelance Merc with a concious, She tended to target those whom she felt deserved it.

It gave Athena some much needed normalcy in hr life. Away from the guns, drugs, money and the thousand other vices she now had to deal with on a daily basis. She shook her head to dislodge the wayward tangents and slipped from the room, erasing her electronic presence with barely a thought. She had spent hours setting up runtimes and viruses that followed her everywhere, erasing her digital presence in her wake so she could dedicate her easily sidetracked mind into more productive thought processes.

Currently she had them taking a catalogue of all sci-fi technology she had seen or read of in her previous world and trying to make them feasible. It was a nice distraction that allowed her mind to leap from project to project while others were happily hacking their way into secret projects. It was like having a classroom full of kindergarteners on sugar highs. It meant that she spent a lot of time running down her various threads, but she had gotten better at allocating tasks and keeping them on track.

Though she did tend to get the most spectacular migraines if she put too many on any single task. Having multiple projects going at once meant that she could shuffle bored runtimes to new topics, which seemed to make them happy. This lead to her new motto "Happy threads, Happy head" cheesy, but true.

She had also discovered a true love for ferreting out heavily guarded secrets. Nothing made her happier than knowing that STG was essentially feeding her information, the irony sometimes made her giggle (something she had begun doing with alarming frequency, coupled with talking to herself out loud). She even had others stalking the shadow broker, trying to map out his impressively extensive network. Even her contact with Miranda Lawson had been useful for her.

Through the Cerberus agent's contact with her employer she was able to find the entryways to the Cerberus network. She couldn't do anything about the three major spy groups, but with their entrances into the extra net mapped, she would then be able to put filters on their network, erasing or re-directing what information she wanted. The soft tinging of an incoming call rang inside her skull and she sighed, it was Aria.

She tucked herself into an unoccupied corner and activated the call, she used computer generated voices to communicate, removing the need to actually speak and thus preventing her calls from being overheard. To the outside world she looked like she was staring into space. "Neith" came the brisk voice of her boss.

"Yes?" she answered, her voice sounding like a Turian male's. "You have another job. I need it done by tomorrow." Athena nodded even though she knew Aria couldn't see her. "Understood" she answered and waited until the queen signed off.

A message informed her of its arrival and she scowled at the laundry list of forging, embezzlement and sabotage that she was required to do but was topped off by the urgent job of physically breaking into a rival gang's hideout to retrieve an OSD with weapons data on it. She sighed and leaned back against the wall and rubbed her eyes. She was not nearly well equipped to do that mission and she was on a time limit.

Three threads postulated just how the infiltration could go, but she pushed them to the side, sending them back to work on her three favorite projects that she wanted done before she met up with Shepard :A Starcraft Ghost visor, a set of multi purpose gauntlets and a gun similar in use to a canister rifle.

The visor was in truth more accurately described as a half mask that was able to provide her with tactical data and act as an information gathering tool, thus eliminating the need for the Omni-tool prop as well as providing her ears with much needed protection from firearms and explosions, something that was uncomfortably loud in small spaces. The gauntlet was more in line with having a wrist mounted swiss army knife that wasn't connected to her and idea of having a grappling line and small portable dart shot was appealing.

If she could cram a flame thrower into the design and keep it small then that would be a bonus. The rifle would, if she could get it to work, act as either a sniper rifle of a semi automatic assault rifle, making her more versatile as a fighter and allowing her to hopefully get off this rock, hopefully into something more in line with a bounty hunter, or body guard. Or at the least, out from under Aria's thumb.

Four months of working under that woman and she had nearly had Aria had her over a barrel, that didn't mean that she could trot Athena out like an exotic pet at a party. It was humiliating and frustrating. Athena had no illusions about killing the Asari, that would solve nothing. And, though she was loath to admit it, Aria did keep this station from falling apart.

The good thing about her projects was that most of the technology she needed for her projects existed, but the materials to make them were expensive and she wanted to do it quietly. There was no way in hell she would let the designs be found by others if she could make them. If she could get her hands on Kasumi's cloaking technology that would also be a true bonus, she didn't like confronting her foes face to face. She hadn't when she was a gamer, and she most certainly didn't now that the bullets could actually hurt her.

She shook her head to clear it up and turned her attention to the location of the hideout and began to hike through the shabby corridors. God, she hated her job, but it put money into her accounts that paid the bills and put food in her mouth. It ensured that her personal escape fund could remain untouched or be allocated to her gear fund. Her focus returned as she came closer to her target. She scanned the hallway carefully, using every sense availability to her.

She had learnt her lesson the last time with the blind. Maybe she could get a heat or motion tracker on her visor when she built it. She refocused faster than it took to blink and hacked the internal cameras. Two beings. A Turian and a Batarian, both in armour. She marked their positions and prepped herself in front of the door before cutting the lights and diving through a tiny crack in the door. Luckily the cameras had night vision.

"What Happened?" the Batarian demanded, drawing her to him first. Her knife slid from it's sheath and she wrapped her hand over his mouth and drove the blade into his jugular, yanking it out with a violent and softly lowering him to the floor.

The Turian was looking around wildly, fumbling with his wrist, trying to activate his omni-tool for light. Not that it would work, she had already disabled both of them and created a loop for the security feeds. It looked like nothing was happening.

"Tarth? Were, are you?" the Turian demanded but she was already behind him. It was truly frightening the amount of information she had been given on how to properly torture, maim and kill her opponents. It was like that little saying of never pissing off a doctor, because they knew exactly what hurt the most.

She leapt up behind the Turian and famed the long blade into the back of his skull. It bit deep into the crack between his plates and she twisted the blade hard, severing the spine and forcing the two plates apart. She removed the knife and gently let his body fall.

She bowed her head in the dark, folding her hands in front of her "Requiescat in pace" she murmured over their bodies before she hurried over to the door that lead deeper into the base. She receded to slip through the compound, often taking to the ducts to avoid killing where she could, and making it painless when she couldn't.

The OSD was plugged into a terminal at the back and she swiftly hacked the whole thing, downloading everything on the drive and setting a thread to sift through the data. The card was also copied before she removed it and stuck it into a pocket on her belt and retreating the way she had come. She may hate her job, but the training she was receiving was top notch, oh the irony.

* * *

A/N- Hope you all enjoy! This story is a wonderful experience to write, I am truly enjoying it. Athena feels so real to me, I am truly excited as to where she will go next. Please review and tell me what you think. And again I am looking for a beta! please someone, help me make this story better!

Safe travels, Trojan Seeress


	5. Change

**Change**

Athena held her angular, custom built, black and silver rife steady as she tracked her target. Her lensed eye held to the scope. It had been a year since she had woken up. One year of abandoning her morals, conscious and pride in order to survive in this harsh and unforgiving universe. Whoever had though this would be a fun idea had no idea what it was like to live in this place. She was now working as Aria's all purpose errand girl.

She killed, stole, tortured, lied and hacked in the name of her employer. It had been a brutal learning curve. She had spent many nights performing first aid on herself or in one of the clinics Aria owned, fixing up the results of her failures. Needless to say she tended not to make the same mistake twice, especially when she had perfect recall of everything she had done and could flag exactly when the mission went to hell in a handbasket, the joys of an artificially eidetic memory.

She had spent hours practicing her martial skills, trying to make her movements smooth and as near to instinctive as it was possible for her to become. Her bruises, abrasions and aching muscles were a testament to the long hours of exercise and training she subjected herself to in the name of excellence. This, combined with her digital prowess made her a useful tool, and a dangerous one.

The truth of the matter was that Aria was not a bad employer, just a hard one. To the Asari's credit though, she did take care of her minions, the paychecks were sent out punctually and in full if the job was done well. Screw ups were informed of their failures and the resulting payment for damages docked as incentive to not screw up. Her apartment was paid for and her basic needs were looked after in the form of a monthly stipend for food and clothes. Not to mention the full use of Aria's personal clinic that she maintained for her employees. Athena could admire the woman's steel resolve and the control she had over her empire; But this admiration was tempered by her resentment at her current predicament.

On a brighter note, her gear wish list was going quite well. The glowing blue lenses of her ghost visor stared out from beneath her slate grey hood that had evolved into a cape that wrapped around her shoulders and diagonal hem with the longest portion hanging to just below her knees. Her casual jacket, pants and boots had all seen upgrades too, she had custom ordered/ built a set of stealth that was as close to skin tight as it was possible to get.

The pieces were all made of a lightweight ceramic compound that covered her chest, throat, knees, calves, forearms and shoulders. Small interlocking plates protected her spine and lower back while the rest of her was sheathed in a suit she had "redirected" from a Cerberus facility. It was a standard body suit with a layer of bullet proof materiel. It was the newest in protective fibers and was the current new favourite toy of several armour manufacturing companies.

It was ridiculously expensive and she had taken great joy in its rescue from the filthy paws of Cerberus. True to her new MO, she had made her armour flexible and tough. It went well with her highly active and blindingly fast acrobatic fighting style and her tendency to slip into shadows. She had even trained herself to shoot mid flip, hanging upside-down and a whole host of other impossible feats.

Of the entire suit, it was her shields she was proudest of. They were scavenged from a Krogan battle master she had found after Aria was finished with him and she had spent hours fine tuning and experimenting with them to create a way to compensate for her minimalist armour. The entire ensemble was a in varying shades of grey, the armour plates being dull slate while the suit was a lighter silver with some faint blue running lights that came with the suit. Her grey cape, veil and visor completed the monochrome uniform and as with her previous outfit, it was designed to blend with the shadows and hide the running lights.

The hood and cape covered a good portion of her armoured shoulders and back, breaking up her shape from an armoured individual into a more harmless cloth wrapped non-combatant. It also prevented her armour from scraping when she took to the vents and ducts. Her veil and hunter knives were the only things that translated over from her original outfit, and she intended to upgrade her armour as fast as the technology came out.

The knives were set in a pair of sheaths on each leg under the holster for a set of pistols she had "liberated" from a gang leader. The end of her long veil was tucked under the wrapped front of her cape, meaning she could hang upside-down and still have it in place. With her taps into the various black op groups belonging to the various species across the galaxy, she had a front row seat for the various pieces of bleeding edge technology as it was developed; truthfully, life was not too terrible.

Her rifle gave a loud coughing sound, and her target dropped dead. Before the body even hit the ground, she was in his omni-tool, draining his accounts. No sense in letting the money go to waste. He wouldn't need it, and she was in need of the cash so she could either buy herself from Aria, or afford her next tech wish; The chances were looking better for the latter, a new cloaking technology had come out that she had her eyes on.

As people began to gather around the body she retracted the long barrel and slung her rifle over her shoulder, attaching the long barreled hybrid to the trio of magnetic clamps that gripped through the cloak. She would have preferred a strap but it tended to bounce and slid to much when she had tried that. She strode through the corridors towards afterlife with calm and even strides.

She had refused to allow herself to appear anything other than calm and collected after her breakdown during her first months, her tendency to speak in a calm monotone seemed to unnerve those she worked with, and she needed all the help she could get. Also, any sign of Weakness was immediately seized and exploited in this hell hole. She sidestepped a puddle of something in the dark, red lit passages that were now her home and frowned beneath her veil, why Aria wanted a personal confirmation on the kill this time was concerning.

A flicker of movement caught her eye and the pale blue outline of a Vorcha scuttling away revealed itself in the blue tint of her visor. She lived in various shades of blue now, the visor barely ever came off and the cool blue light it cast over the world was soothing compared to the dim to non-existent red light that suffused the shadows.

She turned left into a small service hall and began to scale one of the many ladders that existed between floors. She avoided the elevators when possible, too many people and far to easy to corner someone in such a confined space, she would know. She had caught several of her targets in lifts. The bass of Afterlife could be heard before long the club came into view, and the pulsating Neon was as epilepsy inducing as ever.

The bouncer glanced up at her and simply nodded, shuffling over a little to let her in. The ear protectors on her visor immediately went to work, filtering out the painfully loud music that shook her ribcage with its power. She paused in front of the guards but they simply waved her up, this caused her frown to deepen. Usually she was forced to surrender the myriad of weapons she was now packing whenever she went to see the queen.

The fact that she was being permitted up in full kit was… concerning. She moved cautiously up, her fingers brushing her twin pistols in preparation to draw. When she climbed the last few steps she was met with the sight of Aria and a guest. The new comer was an Asari, the blue tinting of Athena's visor made the Asari's skin even bluer while the facial markings faded to a deep purple. By this time Athena was on high alert, she had already identified the Asari as specter Tela Vasir, and this worried her.

Why would a specter have anything to do with her? "Neith, so glad you could join us. I assume from your arrival that your target is dead?" Aria asked her in her usual no nonsense manner. Athena nodded, she usually didn't speak to strangers face to face, it added to her air of mystery. Something she had spent a year cultivating.

"I'm sure you are aware by now that your target was not simply another person who pissed me off, but has something to do with our guest. Tell me, can you give me any information about her?" Aria challenged and Vasir sat back, watching with sharp eyes.

Athena turned to look at the specter and activated her vocal distorter. "Name: Tela Vasir, Species: Asari. Age: five hundred and thirty two. Trained as Asari commando, received decorations for several high class missions, subsequently inducted into the citadel specters twenty years ago. Specter Vasir is a high powered Biotic, specialising in the vanguard class. Favours Scimitar line shotguns, but is also proficient with hand guns and rifles. Specter Vasir is often assigned infiltration missions and is know for her deep hatred of slavers." She dutifully answered, knowing that if she gave anything less then Aria would know.

"Impressive" Vasir remarked before standing and drawing closer, trying to elicit a response from Athena as she pushed into her personal space. Athena didn't move. She knew that the specter was testing her, trying to elicit a response. In the blink of an eye Vasir had a pistol to her head. Unfortunately for Vasir, an eye blink was intolerably slow for Athena. Even as the specters muscles bunched in an action that would lead to her drawing her gun, Athena acted.

Now here they both stood. Athena with a gun held to her forehead and Vasir blinking in shock at the muzzle of Athena's pistol jammed into the bottom of her jaw. Athena stared into the Asari's eyes, knowing that the expressionless lenses of her visor had a tendency to unnerve her opponents.

"You're fast" Vasir praised, a sardonic smirk pulling at her mouth. "Thank you" Athena replied in her monotone voice. With a click the safety was activated on Vasir's weapon and she withdrew, Athena following a fraction of a second later. "She's as fast as you said Aria" the specter told her hostess as she sat down again. Athena smoothly holstered her pistol and returned her attention to the pair on the couch.

"I don't lie about things like that Tela" Aria sniffed before sipping from a small tumbler of alcohol. Athena frowned behind her veil and waited as the two Asari bantered. Her silent presences eventually regained the pairs attention. "Do you have any idea as to why you are here Neith?" Aria asked and Athena shook her head."I make it a point to avoid your mail. A professional courtesy and to avoid the porn you've started filling it with. There are somethings no mortal eye should ever see" she replied stoically under the Asari's canny look.

"Well apparently, Tela here is in need of a hacker and she called in a favour. As of this moment you report to her. After your mission is done she can decide if she will return you to me or if she wants to keep you on as a specialist" Aria informed her.

Athena cocked her head and looked between the two. "Must be some favour" she remarked and Aria snorted "Don't get cheeky Neith. It's a life debt. The fact that she's using it to simply take one of my employees is something I will be thankful for" she informed Athena smartly.

Vasir looked between them with an amused expression "I believe that Neith is the reason you have seen a sixty-eight percent raise in profits this past year. From what I've found and what you've told me, she is perhaps on of the best computer specialists in the Terminus Systems" she told them and Athena supressed the urge to sigh. She was forced to leave a trail as Neith in order to make her cover believable and to promote herself.

People looking for hackers wanted hackers they could find, a twisted form of logic but it was how the game was played. "Do I get any say at the end of my loan?" she asked resignedly and Aria smirked again. "What do you think" was the sarcastic answer. Athena bowed her head in agreement "then I will gather my things" she told them before turning to leave.

"Are you just going to let her get away with that kind of disrespect?" Tela asked incredulously as she walked away. "That's just Neith's personal form of rebellion. She knows whose in charge and she'll do her job. But she has an independent streak that she occasionally indulges" Aria answered blithely before Athena withdrew from earshot. S

he passed a merchant stall and purchased a worn but still serviceable duffle bag to hold her gear and set up a call to Desta. The Mercenary answered on the third ring. "Athena, hey!" she greeted. "Hey Desta. How's life in your corner of omega?" she asked and could almost hear the shrug.

"Same old, same old. Shoot some people, intimidate others. Collect the money. You?" she answered ad Athena sighed over the line "Aria sold me off to a specter. It looks like I may be leaving this hell hole behind, if at least temporarily" Desta made a pleased sound. "that's good. It gets you away from her and means that there is a chance of you getting your freedom and out into the wider galaxy. You have big plans, I know it. You will do fine out there. Just remember what I taught you" she reassured and Athena smiled.

"To drink often and get into bar fights frequently?" she joked "that happened one time!" Desta protested and Athena laughed, something she only seemed to do when talking to her friend. "I know but you know that the extra net is forever" she threw back before her voice became somber. "I just wanted to say goodbye Desta, in case something happens to me, or I actually do get off this rock permanently."

"I know Athena. And I hope you do get away. In fact, if I see you again on Omega I will kick your ass" Desta told her firmly. Athena smiled a little and hung up before she checked her friend's location on the station. Desta was actually pretty close to where Vasir's ship waited She hurried to her nook and collected up all of her electronics, knick-knacks, spare gear and clothes. Everything she owned in this world fit into a small duffle bag that she slung over her shoulder before hurrying to her friend's position.

Desta was sitting on a crate playing fruit ninja on her omni-tool. The game had come to space with Humanity and become a hit on the citadel. "Desta" she called and the Asari looked up from her game "what are you doing here? I thought you were shipping out" she demanded as Athena drew nearer. "yeah, but I just wanted to give you this" she told her friend, handing her a bundle wrapped in some spare fabric from when she had altered her hood.

Desta took the bundle and unwrapped it. A fist sized sphere made of metal and polymer sat on the cloth, its dull metal surface looking innocuous. "What is it?" Desta asked and Athena smiled.

"Push the button" she instructed, pointing to a small blue button inset into the surface. Desta did and the ball lit up and began to hover.

"Greetings" the ball said in a polite British accent. "Thank you for activating the Personal Access and Scouting Sphere. You may call me Ghost" it informed Desta, bobbing a little on it's repulsors. "What?" Desta asked and Athena smiled.

"It's a VI powered companion, capable of providing tactical info and hacking through most basic systems. It links up to your omni-tool and is essentially a spy drone that can provide you with data on the fly. I programed it myself" she told her friend, feeling very proud of her creation.

"It's awesome" Desta said, watching as the little ball began to float around her. "What happens if someone tries to take it? I know how paranoid you are about your designs" she asked and Athena found herself grinning wolfishly.

"It goes boom if someone tries to open it, and I made sure to shield it from scanning" she answered smugly.

Desta smiled and hugged her. "Thank you so much. I'll treasure it. Now you had better get going. I heard that specters hate to be kept waiting" Athena nodded, feeling her eyes tear up a little. "Thank you so much for everything Desta. Don't get dead" she begged, returning the hug a little. Desta released her and all but shoved her out of the door, a smile on her face. Athena forced her eyes to stop watering and composed herself to greet her new employer.

The ship was unassuming, Asari in make with a few visible weapons to deter attackers. It looked like one of thousands of Asari transports out there. She stood at the airlock and sent a message inside to announce her arrival. The door slid open and Vasir stood there impassively. "Took you long enough" she remarked and Athena merely inclined her head. "My things were far from Afterlife, it took some time to traverse the station" she replied calmly.

Vasir looked her over and nodded, standing aside to let Athena in. "This is the Neraleth. It's mine, and everyone working on it are under my employ." She informed Athena who nodded, accessing the ship manifest

. "And not including yourself or me, there are only eight crew members. three engineers, one pilot, and four soldiers who assists you on ground missions, one of them acting as the weapons officer" she remarked, entering and looking around the small ship. To her left was the cockpit, where a young Salarian was running through the pre-flight check list. "Yes. How did you know?" Vasir demanded and Athena shrugged.

"It's there for all to see, the manifest is attached to the ship computers. Anyone with any ability could read it" she replied, turning to the right and looking at the small common with a large central table used for meetings and meals. It was bracketed by sleeper pods on one wall with a kitchenet in the right corner. A communal washroom sat to the left of the common room and the medbay and engineering were on the next floor, below that was a small cargo hold, big enough for a small load.

"So I assume that we are leaving soon?" she asked and Vasir nodded, walking past her "do you need the tour?" the Specter asked but Athena shook her head.

"No, I have the schematics" Vasir nodded and pointed to a locker near the sleeper pods. "that one is yours for the trip. Stow your armour and weapons there as well. Hope you like nutrient paste, cause that's what's on the menu" Vasir informed her and Athena nodded "understood" she acknowledged. "And the briefing will be in two hours" Vasir added before walking back toward the cockpit. Athena looked after her and shrugged before walking over to the locker and unloading her belongings onto the selves before tucking her bag into the bottom.

She unbuckled her armour and set it neatly on the racks designed to hold it but refrained from removing her cape, body suit, or veil. Her visor was pushed up so it sat on top of her head and her weapons found their homes on the hooks inside her locker. Satisfied with her new arrangement she pulled out the components for her current project and walked over to one of the seats in the common area and sat down, quietly checking on her threads.

They were all in a great tizzy, attempting to understand what had caused this sudden shift from their happy routine. She silenced them with a quick summery of the situation and the quickly quieted down. It was a little concerning how independent those threads were becoming, but she figured that it was her organic mind attempting to rationalize the numerous data streams she had to sift through faster than the speed of organic thought.

She had grown use to how slow the rest of the universe felt now. A simple conversation could feel like she was talking to an Ent, where it took all day just to say good morning. A day may as well have been a year, for her thoughts and she had spent many of them digging into the extra-net. It was the only place were things moved at a speed that was anything near comfortable. She shook her head, a tick she had developed to keep herself from diving to deep into her own brain and focused on the real world. There was a loud thud and she felt the ship disengage from the station. She paused for a moment to revel in the fact that she was leaving Omega before turning her mind back to her threads with a frown. It took her ten whole minutes to reorganize them before she set them back to work.

Mind now relatively quieter she turned her attention to the pair of projects before her. to the left was a sphere similar to the one she had given Desta, only this one came with more toys and was about the size of a grapefruit. She was in the process of installing it's coding so she didn't have to physically tinker with it. With a large percentage of her brain focusing on that, she turned her primary attention to her second project.

The parts were now sitting on the table in front of her, ready for her to assemble. These were her prototype gauntlets. She had most of the pieces working, hidden blade, dart launcher, grappling hook, all purpose jack for if she needed to physically connect to a computer via an external port and an omni-tool for each arm. While she may not need the computing abilities of the Omni-tool, she still had use for the mini fabricator and a handful of other functions including her own version of the omni-blade. Though it was still in testing.

They truly were fabulous pieces of equipment and she intended to utilize them fully. The only problem was the flame thrower functions. It was something she really, really wanted, but was looking like she would have to wait before she could go around barbecuing husks and Krogan, mores the pity. She sighed and set to work sealing the gauntlets.

The tiny soldering torch on her omni-tool closing seams and smoothing out the surface. "Everyone to the common room for a briefing" Vasir's voice told the ship through the comms. Athena looked up, startled out of her work and noticed Vasir walking out of the cockpit and sitting herself at the head of the table. "What is that?" the Specter asked, pointing at Athena's projects Athena looked down at them and shrugged.

"Some toys I've been working on. Multi purpose gauntlets and a spy drone" she answered pushing the button to activate the drone, testing it's programing. It whirled to life and floated up. Small panels on it moved as it surveyed the area. "Hello" a familiar synthetic female voice greeted her. "I see that I have been activated. How nice" it drawled and Athena grinned under her veil. It turned and a small glowing blue eye opened and surveyed her.

"How do you do" it asked her formally and Athena inclined her head. "I am well. And glad that your activation went smoothly. Please state your designation and purpose for testing purposes" she directed it. The sphere floated a little high. "This is the Personal access and Scouting sphere, designation Glados. This device is designed to act as a real time scout, information retrieval unit and tactical data relay to it's maker, current designation Neith." It informed the room and Athena nodded at her creation.

"Thank you Glados, please settle into orbit and observe" she commanded. "Confirmed" the globe floated to just behind her left shoulder and went silent. "Is that an AI?" Vasir demanded, reaching for her side arm but Athena shook her head. "No, it is not an AI, just a very realistic VI, I spent a lot of time working on the coding, making sure it fell within council regulations" Vasir took her hand off of her pistol but continued to watch the small sphere that bobbed behind Athena's shoulder.

"If that thing goes rogue then I will kill you. Understand me?" she demanded. Athena nodded and sent a mental command to Glados that set it to only transmitting in her head. ' _It's good to see that they fear us. Fear is an excellent motivator'_ Glados remarked smugly and Athena sighed, great. Another voice in her head. At the rate they were accumulating she should start charging rent.

At that though a thread alerted the others and they began giving out bargains for how much each thread was willing to pay for the privilege of using her mind. It included fixed monthly rates and bonus payments to be assigned to the more choice assignments. She let out a groan and threw her head forward. Smacking it into the table loudly. Vasir stared at her as she shook her head hard and sat up again, rubbing her forehead.

"Sorry. Medical condition" she mumbled as an explanation. "What kind of condition." Vasir demanded and Athena shrugged. "a form of twitch, non-contagious and doesn't affect my fighting capabilities" she informed her new boss with a sigh. Vasir looked at her uncertainly from the corner of her eye but turned her attention to her arriving crew. As they entered Athena carefully packed up her project and set them in a neat pile next to her.

The crew members sat down and looked at Athena warily, uncertain of her or her new friend. The pilot was a Salarian by the name of Jedran Vesak, once a shuttle pilot press ganged into Vasir's service. A pair of Asari with very similar facial features watched Athena carefully, the one on the left occasionally letting her hand drift to the pistol holstered on her thigh. Athena's threads identified them as Ana and Vela T'nos. Siblings who both served in the Asari navy, one as a ship engineer and the other as a Commando.

A Salarian wearing a dark blue jumpsuit covered in grease stains sat down, cleaning his hands off on a rag. Asran Nesal, former private machinest, now working for Vasir. Another Asari with pale lavender skin sat next to Asran, looking at Athena with curious eyes; Lena Letal, young maiden who tried to go play Mercenary but wound up captured by slavers and subsequently freed by Vasir, she worked as the third engineer for this ship.

The last two were another Asari commando and a Turian who had finished his tour in the military and been picked up in a bar by Vasir when she was looking for crew. Their names were Sira and Calamus Sektus, recently married. This diverse crew seemed interesting enough, though none of them were very old. None of the Asari were over five centuries.

"Everyone, this is Neith, our computer specialist for this mission." Vasir introduced, gesturing to Athena who nodded her head in greeting.

"Why do we need a specialist?" Vela, the commando demanded refusing to take her eyes from Athena, trying to pierce the shadows of Athena's hood.

"Because we are going to be going to be investigating corruption in several major corporations we think are in someway connected in funding a human extremist group" Vasir told them seriously "While not an obvious threat yet, they have been found to be performing some rather…unethical experiments on everyone they can get their hands on. As such they have been deemed a minor threat at the moment, and the council has asked me to investigate them."

Athena stiffened, "we're hunting Cerberus?" she asked quietly, drawing everyone's attention to her. "Yes" Vasir answered, her face set in a grim expression. "What do you know of them?" Vela demanded and Athena turned her eyes to them slowly. "Far more than anyone in this room. Let me simply say that however bad you think they are. They're worse. Whatever depraved rumors you've heard of them are most likely true.

They need to be taken down. If we're going after the hell hound, then I am an enthusiastic participant" she told them, her voice soft and slightly menacing. The whole table stared at her in shock. "We are currently gathering information on them. If they warrant taking down, then we do. But this is not just a way to satisfy a vendetta. Is that clear?" Vasir demanded sternly. Athena turned away a little, staring into the shadows behind Jedran. "Crystal" she replied in her usual monotone.

"What the hell did they do to you anyway?" Ana asked, leaning forward curiously. Athena lowered her head a little before turning to face Vasir "There is a reason Aria was able to sell me to you the way that she did." She answered simply.

Vasir stared at her in shock "sell you?" she demanded in surprise. "You didn't think I was a willing employee, did you?" Athena answered, a touch of bitterness in her voice. Vasir looked a little uncomfortable and Athena sighed, shaking her head "that explains the hostility" she muttered before adding in a louder voice. "Aria holds my life in her hands, if I don't obey she will sell me to Cerberus. As a result, I am little more than a slave to her, and now it seems to you" she finished, holding Vasir's eyes from the shadows of her hood. The entire crew stared at her on shock but Athena ignored them, choosing instead to focus on Vasir.

Their staring match lasted only a few moments, but Vasir broke away, looking back at the Hologram and Athena decided to refocus on the mission. "What are we looking for and where. I have a great deal of experience with their systems. Just point me at them and they will never even know we were there" She asked, poking a thread through the files in 's omni-tool looking for the mission files. Vasir seemed to shake herself back to work and brought up a hologram of a building.

"This is Zennax Incorporated, our intel believes it to be a shell front for Cerberus, their credits help fund their operations, also there is some rumor about them having a link to several of their more…clandestine projects" she informed them, hesitating a little as she searched for a word. Athena leaned forward and squinted at the building, her threads already gleefully diving into the extra-net looking for their target. She flicked her visor down for show and cocked her head to the side. "They are. The companies' main shareholder only exists on paper. The money is being funned through several accounts before landing in the Cerberus coffers" she reported before leaning back and activating her sapphire omni-tool, showing them the files she had just pulled up, including a more detailed blueprint of the building. The others stared at her, their mouths hanging open.

"How… when.. how?" Vasir demanded looking at the files that were transferred to the main holoprojector. "I'm good at what I do" Athena answered simply. The others shook their heads in awe and Vasir frowned. "With this intel, that means we had to get in there and crack their secure databases. They're on an independent server not linked to the extra-net. We need all that data" she ordered, looking stern.

"Neith, you have combat and infiltration experience right?" She asked looking to Athena who nodded "its among my capabilities, yes" she answered. Vasir nodded and rubbed her nose. "right, Neith and I will go in, get the data and get out. I want the ship standing by, ready to get us out of there if it goes south" she commanded and everyone nodded in agreement. "dismissed" Vasir told them but looked at Athena "you, stay please" she added and Athena sank back into her seat, waiting.

"Aria said that you were a private contractor who owed her a favour. What are you actually?" She asked once the others had returned to their activities, leaving them alone in the common area. Athena flicked her visor up and leaned back in her chair, considering the Asari in front of her. "Aria keeps me from being handed back to Cerberus. They don't like it when their test subjects escape. We tend to hold grudges" she explained briefly Vasir shook her head "what were they testing on you?" she asked.

Athena shrugged "pain management. They wanted to see what would happen if you stimulated the brain to imagine pain. How would the body react" she answered simply. "Goddess" Vasir breathed is horror. Athena shook her head and stood, gathering her projects and tucking them under her arm. "Do you know anything about human mythologies Specter?" she asked conversationally and Vasir shook her head, confused where this conversation was leading.

"Can't say that I do" she admitted. "Cerberus is the three headed hell hound that guards the entrance of the underworld. Its purpose was to keep souls in and prevent the living from entering. I intend to seal the mouth of hell and starve the hellhound where it stands. My codename Neith is the name of the Ancient Egyptian goddess of Hunting, wisdom and war. I will bring war to their doorstep." Athena informed her employer, frost leaking into her voice.

Vasir stared at her, noting how she could see the resolve in Neith's frame even though none of the human's face was visible. "Glad to have you aboard" she settled for, smiling and offering her hand to her newest crewmember. Neith looked down at the limb for a moment before reaching out and taking it.

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A/N- and another chapter up. I hope you like. Please read and review! I like to know what you think!

Safe travels, Trojan Seeress.


	6. Test

**Tests**

Tela Vasir was good at what she did. This was a fact. Twenty years working as an agent to the council had honed her to a razor fine edge. She liked to think that she was at the very least competent in all her fields and if not, knew those who were. But watching Neith as she worked was like watching poetry in motion. They were in the process of gaining entry to Zannex's main facility and Neith was hacking through several firewalls to get them an entry through the air ducts.

"K, were in" the distorted voice informed her, "Follow my lead and I'll get you to the mainframe" she added before she slithered into the metal tube. Tela watched with fascination as the human slid silently along. There was no scraping from the unusual rifle on her back, or her armour. The cape actually softened the small sounds she did make, muffling her movements. Tela had scoffed at it at first, thinking it impractical. But now saw that it was made for a purpose.

"We will have to shimmy up a vent here" Neith reported as they reached a six-way intersection rocking back a little on her heels to look at Tela. The multiple lenses on her strange mask glowing faintly in the dark. "How high?" Tela asked and Neith cocked her head, no doubt reading off of her tactical visor. "thirty meters" she reported. "I have an idea though. Give me a sec" she answered. Tela watched silently as Neith reached into a pouch and withdrew the small globe. "Glados can check if there is anywhere to latch a line on to. That will save us from having to grip the sides" The small globe lit up and began to hover.

" _How nice of you to finally activate me. I was beginning to think that you didn't trust my use"_ that chilling synthetic voice drawled quietly and Neith shrugged.

"I was unsure, now quit your pouting and please check to see if my grapple line will have a spot to grip" Neith commanded to the orb. " _To hear is to obey_ " the sphere snarked before it floated away gently.

"Are you sure that it's not an AI?" Tela hissed quietly and Neith snorted. "I programed it to be snarky, but ultimately loyal. I get bored and some witty banter helps with that" she admitted with what sounded like a smile in her voice before Glados floated back. " _There is a small ledge. If you give me the grappler I can hook it on"_ the sphere informed them in a bored voice.

Tela wanted to ask the sphere what it meant but was precluded from that when Neith pulled something from the silver gauntlet on her right arm and hold it out to the sphere. It popped open and showed that it was a grappling hook attached to a thin line of silver cord. A pair of tiny graspers emerged from the sphere and took a hold of the instrument and floated back up the shaft. More of the cord unspooled from the gauntlet that Tela now recognized as the project that Neith had been working on the entire trip here. There was a soft pinging sound and Neith looked back at Tela.

"I'll go up then send Glados with the hook and I'll pull you up" Neith offered and Tela nodded. Neith was professional, rarely spoke with inflection and though she seemed to process a dry wit with a healthy dose of dark humor, she never relaxed. The hood never came off and the veil was a permanent fixture on the human's face. Though truthfully, that level of paranoia made sense to Tela. When someone is actually out to get you, then nothing is too much.

But she was worried about the hacker, Neith had a habit of hitting her head repeatedly. Sometimes it was a simple slap against the side of her skull, while other times it was a long sessions of thudding her head against walls, tables, door jambs. It was almost like she was trying to affect a hard reset of her brain, and had resorted to hitting it to make it work. She would also randomly shake her head. Nothing prolonged, just a quick movement, like an animal trying to flick something from its ear.

She claimed afterward that it was a twitch but Tela wondered if it was a hold over from those pain experiments Neith had mentioned. It was also clear that Neith was incredibly angry, though she hid it most of the time. Whenever Cerberus was mentioned she tended to go very still, sometimes barely even breathing. The venom in her voice when she spoke of the human group and her vow to bring them down had been the first sign of emotion from the human.

This thankfully proved that she wasn't a drone or a Geth, but raised a whole slew of questions about the organization and led Tela to think that it was probably far more dangerous then most realized. The tiny drone returned and Neith nodded, letting the winch inside her gauntlet begin to haul her up the shaft, her grey armour and cape causing her to fade away almost instantly. Tela waited in the dark, curious. In truth she was testing Neith. She needed to know if she could work as a part of a team and how she handled herself in tense situations. So far the cold efficiency had yet to so much as chip.

Neith was utterly focused, though she might banter with that stupid drone she had made, Neith plowed on like a shadowy juggernaut. The reason she had gone hunting for the hacker was simple. It was either Neith or the Shadow broker. The Broker had been making overtures to her, information in exchange for her doing missions for him. She had her pride but she knew that she would sacrifice it if it would complete her mission in a heart beat. Neith had appeared on the scene a year ago. Silent and deadly, barely more than a whisper on the forums. Other hackers began to mutter about Aria's newest attack dog.

"The Grey Ghost" they called her. They didn't even know her gender, there were arguments that Neith was an Asari, others declared her a Quarian with a grudge and still more thought she was a group working under the pseudonym of Neith. The name was so ambiguous the they could have been anyone. What was true though was that Neith would do contract work for a price and they always delivered. Aria had taken to mentioning the ghost's name frequently when threatening those she didn't like and the Shadow broker had a standing bounty out for her. Any information and/or images of Neith carried a heft price.

In the end If she could get Neith to work for her then she would be free of the need to use the Broker, and that was something worth putting up with a few eccentricates. The drone reappeared, startling her from her thoughts and nudging her arm, offering her the grappler.

" _Here, this should allow her to haul your not inconsiderable bulk up the shaft. Though I highly doubt that the extremely efficient winch will be able to handle someone of your…Generousness"_ it drawled at her. Tela gaped at the cheeky little sphere. A series of panels around the eye flicked out in a wave like sequence. " _I would suggest a less accurate drooling idiot impersonation, hard though it may be to rearrange you facial muscles into something that would indicate that you actually have two brain cells to rub together and find a way to attach the grapple"_ it added in a sarcastic, yet bored sounding drawl. Tela snapped her mouth shut and glared at the construct as she grabbed the offered grappling hook and attaching it to the repelling harness attached to her belt. She tugged on the line twice and felt it start to retract.

It was truthfully a little nerve wracking to be suspended over the seemingly bottomless drop by little more than a silver thread. Neith was braced against the walls of the vent, her right hand extended out to allow the winch to work. Once Tela had a grip of the edge she reached forward and grasped the specters arm, pulling her up the rest of the way. They resumed their trek through the vents, with Neith calling out their position. They had to repeat the grappler trick several more times until they rested in the vents on the thirtieth floor of the small office building.

Neith slithered over a vent then turned around, facing Tela with the glowing grill between them. She pointed down and used standard Asari military hand signals to communicate that their target was in the room bellow them as well as three guards. Tela nodded and sent back the signal for Neith to enter and take them out quietly. Neith paused, cocked her head then nodded, asking if she had permission to kill. Tela considered then replied negatively.

"alive but quiet" she signaled and Neith nodded. She reached out and gently removed the grill that levered up towards her. It was set aside where she couldn't bump it. Then she hooked her grapple into a reinforced strut eased out of vent. Tela watched in silence as Neith lowered herself to the ground. Once Neith had vacated the vent entrance, Tela cautiously extended her wrist with her omni-tool to record what was happening so she could review it latter, watching what it recorded in the visor she slipped over one eye.

Neith landed in a crouch, pressing some hidden button on her gauntlet. There was a soft sound as the prongs holding the grapple retracted and it slid out of the vent. She crept up behind the first guard, all of whom were human. Blow to the back of his head knocked him out with no sound and she eased him to the floor. Creeping quickly behind the next one, she grabbed him.

One had went over his mouth while her armoured forearm pressing against his throat. He clutched at her forearm, gauntleted fingers scrapping of the matte grey plate and causing her cape to ripple under his struggles. The third one turned, a yelp on his lips but she released her prisoner's mouth, not that he could make a sound. She aimed her now unoccupied arm at him. There was a soft thwwwp sound and he collapsed, a silver dart poking out of his neck. Her final victim finally subsided from loss of oxygen and she lowered him to the floor as well.

She looked up and saw the omni-tool poking out and recording. She nodded and signed the all clear. Tela withdrew her omni-tool and dropped down to join Neith at the terminal. "so, this is it?" She asked the Hacker who nodded, cleaning the small drop of blood from the tri-finned silver dart she had retired from her final victim and putting it into a pouch on her armour. "How long does that last?" Tela asked, nodding to the now silent agent. He was laying in a boneless heap, drooling into the grey industrial carpet. Neith shrugged.

"If I measured the dosage correctly then he should be like that for three hours." she answered. Tela stared at her, curious of her apathy. "Do you care about him at all?" she asked, trying to get a feel of what she was thinking. Neith shrugged "If I must kill him I will. If not then I won't. He has a high class medical insurance that will ensure that he will be treated correctly" she replied simply, turning her attention to the terminal.

Tela stared after her as Neith's fingers began to fly over the keyboard, faster than Tela could even understand. "How do you know that?" she demanded and Neith looked at her and tapped the glowing blue lenses. "These give me a basic profile on anyone they have a lock on. This includes a person's health insurance so I know what I can do to them" she answered before turning back to the terminal and continuing to ransack it. I took another minute and thirty seconds before she stepped back, her blue omni tool on the left arm opening and the files were copied onto an OSD that she then ejected and handed to Tela.

"There you go" she answered. Tela looked down at the storage devise she now held and nodded, tucking it into her pocket. "Good. Can you get us out?" she asked. Neith looked at her in what she could only call a curious manner, head cocked a little to the left. "Yes, I assume you want a different way out then how we got in?" she clarified and Tela nodded.

Neith grew absolutely still, in a way Tela was beginning recognize as her thinking pose. She remained that way for barely half a minute before she began moving again. "There are three way to do this: one- take the vents but different rout. Two- blast our way out using all available assets, this will lead to at least five fatalities and possible injury on our part. Three- we stealth our way through, this has high risks of discovery, which in turn would lead to it becoming option two by default." She answered and Tela was struck by how much she sounded like a mech. "Option three" she decided, she need to see Neith in action.

So far the woman didn't disappoint, but Tela had a feeling that Neith preferred the shadows. Her gun was also clearly a snipper rifle, unsuited for hallway combat. Tela was sure that the pistols Neith wore would have to make an appearance if they did get into a firefight. "Option three then" Neith agreed, nodding and flaring her omni-tool. "I've plotted us a course through the building that should lead us out, I've checked guard schedules and set us on a pattern that should avoid them" she informed Tela.

Shutting her omni-tool. "If we get separated, Glados will stay with you and maintain contact." She informed Tela who nodded. The orb floated over and took up a position behind her shoulder, still silent. The door opened ad Neith deactivated her omni-tool, slinking out with a cautious confidence. She didn't skulk from shadow to shadow, but moved with a soft tread through the center of the hall.

She would pause at intersections and triple check hallways for hiding places. They never needed them though. Neith had plotted well, ensuring that they never encountered a single living being. The cameras were also handled, with Neith informing Tela of a program that wiped her digital presence as it was recorded. They slipped out through a maintenance door in the basement and escaped into the tunnels beneath the main tower. Tela continued her observation, making mental notes on Neith's tactics and feeling impressed at the accuracy of Neith's prediction of the guard schedule. The made it back to the ship without incident.

Tela felt a slight relaxing in her shoulders as the airlock door closed behind her and their ship took off. Neith however was still ramrod straight. "Glados, return to primary orbit" she commanded, walking toward the common area. ' _Of course, I am glad that I was not required to aid the subject, as that would have contaminated the test'_ the sphere remarked as it drifted back to it's place behind Neith's left shoulder. Tela watched her warily, something was off with the hacker, she was far to cautious.

Glados' bright blue eye remained riveted on Tela even though Neith never looked back at her. "Why am I here" Neith asked quietly. Tela watched her carefully as she walked around the immobile woman, aiming for the central table. Glados turned to follow her, unwavering in its observation. Tela sat down and looked up at Neith, the human was tall, and the multiple blue lights of her mask's lenses was slightly unnerving. "I'm going to tell you the truth" she informed the hacker, knowing that Neith would no accept anything less.

From her brief acquaintance with the woman Tela knew that Neith did not trust easily, and she was perfectly capable of destroying Tela digitally. Why she had yet to turn on Aria was a mystery, but Tela had reviewed the hackers actions extensively, listening to Aria brag about the brutality and efficiency of the Hacker.

"Have a seat" she gestured to the chair across from her but Neith remained standing. Her body language had all but vanished, something Tela was beginning to realise was a warning sign, it was different than her thinking stillness. It was a tense immobility. She sighed and leaned back in her chair "I have recently been approached by the Shadow Broker, offering information in exchange for my performing tasks for him. I would rather not be in his pay. But if I have too, I will accept" she admitted, watching Neith carefully.

There was no reaction from the woman and Tela ploughed on. "you were my only other option. It is known that Aria gained a new pet who was very good at gathering information. I had a life debt from the woman so I called it in and got you transferred to me. I'm hoping that after this mission you will either consent to work for me or at least give me information" she finished, steepling her fingers and leaning back.

Neith cocked her head. "you want to use me to avoid the Broker…" she mused, the vocal distorter making it sound like a low growl. She looked up, blue lenses meeting Tela's eyes. "I want my freedom Vasir. I want to be my own person, free to go where I want and do as I please without having to report back to some boss. My time in the labs stripped me of most of my innocence, my time on Omega took what little I had left." Neith's distorted voice had lowered a little, anger tinging it.

Tela watched cautiously as Neith straightened and Tela all but held her breath. "After this mission, if you let me go free, I will supply you with information. I have no love for the Broker and anything the robs him of a resource is something I condone. If you hold to your word, then I will hold to mine" she answered finally. Tela felt her shoulders relax. "After we have the information on Cerberus to supply the council. You will be free to go. I swear it" she vowed and watched as Neith's shoulders relaxed slightly.

The Hacker nodded before walking quietly to the lift and taking it down to her hidey-hole on the cargo level. Tela sagged into her seat, letting out a ling slow breath. Neith was beyond paranoid, and extremely angry, but she had a feeling that the woman's word meant a great deal to her. She sat up and left in the direction of her cabin, preparing to read through the information they had recived and her report to the council.

* * *

a/n- this has been sitting in my computer for a while, but I hope to continue it some more if people want me to.

Safe travels, Trojan seeress


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